Tag: Rankings

Every Keanu Reeves Movie Performance, Ranked

Photo: Emily Denniston/Vulture and photos courtesy of the studios

This article was originally published in 2019. It has been updated to include films that Keanu Reeves has made since then. Whoa.

Keanu Reeves has been a movie star for more than 40 years, but it seems like only in the past decade that journalists and critics have come to acknowledge the significance of his onscreen achievements. He’s had hits throughout his career, ranging from teen comedies (Bill & Ted’s) to action franchises (The Matrix, John Wick), yet a large part of the press has always treated these successes as bizarre anomalies. And that’s because we as a society have never been able to understand fully what Reeves does that makes his films so special.

In part, this disconnect is the lingering cultural memory of Reeves as Theodore Logan. No matter if he’s in Speed or Bram Stoker’s Dracula or Something’s Gotta Give, he still possesses the fresh-faced openness that was forever personified by Ted’s favorite expression: “Whoa!” That wide-eyed exclamation has been Reeves’s official trademark ever since, and its eternal adolescent naïveté has kept him from being properly judged on the merits of his work.

Some of that critical reassessment has been provided, quite eloquently, by Vulture’s own Angelica Jade Bastién, who has argued for Reeves’s greatness as an action star and his importance to The Matrix (and 21st-century blockbusters in general). Two of her observations are worth quoting in full, and they both have to do with how he has reshaped big-screen machismo. In 2017, she wrote, “What makes Reeves different from other action stars is this vulnerable, open relationship with the camera — it adds a through-line of loneliness that shapes all his greatest action-movie characters, from naïve hotshots like Johnny Utah to exuberant ‘chosen ones’ like Neo to weathered professionals like John Wick.” In the same piece, Bastién noted: “By and large, Hollywood action heroes revere a troubling brand of American masculinity that leaves no room for displays of authentic emotion. Throughout Reeves’s career, he has shied away from this. His characters are often led into new worlds by women of far greater skill and experience … There is a sincerity he brings to his characters that make them human, even when their prowess makes them seem nearly supernatural.”

In other words, the femininity of his beauty — not to mention his slightly odd cadence when delivering dialogue, as if he’s an alien still learning how Earthlings speak — has made him seem bizarre to audiences who have come to expect their leading men to act and carry themselves in a particular way. Critics have had a difficult time taking him seriously because it was never quite clear if what he was doing — or what was seemingly “missing” from his acting approach — was intentional or a failing.

This is not to say that Reeves hasn’t made mistakes. While putting together this ranking of his every film role, we noticed that there was an alarmingly copious number of duds — either because he chose bad material or the filmmakers didn’t quite know what to do with him. But it’s clear that his many memorable performances weren’t all just flukes. From Dangerous Liaisons to Man of Tai Chi — or River’s Edge to Knock Knock — he’s been on a journey to grow as an actor while not losing that elemental intimacy he has with the viewer. With Good Fortune now in theaters, we revisit those performances — from worst to best.

The nadir of the ’90s cyberpunk genre, and a movie so bad, with Reeves so stranded, that it’s actually a bit of a surprise the Wachowskis were able to forget about it and still cast him as Neo. Dumber than a box of rocks, it’s a movie about technology and the internet — based on a William Gibson story! — that seems to have been made by people who had never turned on a computer before. Seriously, watch this shit:

This movie exists in many ways because of its stunt casting: James Spader as a dogged detective and Keanu as the serial killer obsessed with him. Wait, shouldn’t those roles be switched? Get it? There would come a time in his career when Keanu could have maybe handled this character, but here, still with his floppy Ted Logan hair, he just looks ridiculous. The hackneyed screenplay does him no favors, either. Disturbingly, Reeves claims that he was forced to do this movie because his assistant forged his signature on a contract. He received the fifth of his seven Razzie nominations for this film. (He has yet to win and hasn’t been nominated in 17 years. In fact, it’s another sign of how lame the Razzies are that he got a “Redeemer” award in 2015, as if he needed to “redeem” anything to those people.)

It’s a testament to how cloying and clunky Sweet November is that its two leads (Reeves and Charlize Theron) are, today, the pinnacle of action-movie cool — thanks to the same filmmaker, Atomic Blonde and John Wick’s David Leitch — yet so inert and waxen here. This is a career low point for both actors, preying on their weak spots. Watching it now, you can see there’s an undeniable discomfort on their faces: If being a movie star means doing junk like this, what’s the point? They’d eventually figure it all out.

As far as premises for thrillers go, this isn’t the worst idea: A team of scientists are wiped out — with their murder pinned on poor Keanu — because they’ve figured out how to transform water into fuel. (Hey, Science, it has been 23 years. Why haven’t you solved this yet?) Sadly, this turns into a by-the-numbers chase flick with Reeves as Richard Kimble, trying to prove his innocence while on the run. He hadn’t quite figured out how to give a project like this much oomph yet, so it just mostly lies around, making you wish you were watching The Fugitive instead.

In 2013, Reeves made his directorial debut with a Hong Kong–style action film. We’ll get into that one later, because it’s a ton better than this jumbled mess, a mishmash of fantasy and swordplay that mostly just gives viewers a headache. Also: This has to be the worst wig of Keanu’s career, yes?

Gus Van Sant’s famously terrible adaptation of Tom Robbins’s novel never gets the tone even close to right, and all sorts of amazing actors are stranded and flailing around. Reeves gets some of the worst of it: Why cast one of the most famously chill actors on the planet and have him keep hyperventilating?

In the wake of John Wick’s success, Keanu has had the opportunity to sleepwalk through some lesser sci-fi actioners, and this one is particularly sleepy. The idea of a neuroscientist (Reeves) who tries to clone his family after they die in an accident could have been a Pet Sematary update, but the movie insists on an Evil Corporation plot that we’ve seen a million times before. John Wick has allowed Reeves to cash more random checks than he might have ten years ago. Here’s one of them.

As far as we know, the only movie taken directly from a Soundgarden lyric — unless we’re missing a superhero named “Spoonman” — is this pseudo-romantic comedy that attempts to be cut from the Tarantino cloth but ends up making you think everyone onscreen desperately needs a haircut and a shave. Reeves can tap into that slacker vibe if asked to, but he requires much better material than this.

To state the obvious, it would not fly today for Keanu Reeves to play Prince Siddhartha, a monk who would become the Buddha. But questions of cultural appropriation aside, you can understand what drew The Last Emperor director Bernardo Bertolucci to cast this supremely placid man as an iconic noble figure. Unfortunately, Little Buddha never rises above a well-meaning, simplistic depiction of the roots of a worldwide religion, and the effects have aged even more poorly. Nonetheless, Reeves is quite accomplished at being very still.

Quick anecdote: We saw this Kenneth Branagh adaptation of the Bard during its original theatrical run, and when Reeves’s villainous Don John came onscreen and declared, “I am not of many words,” the audience clapped sarcastically. That memory stuck because it encapsulates viewers’ inability in the early ’90s to see him as anything other than a dim SoCal kid. Unfortunately, his performance in Much Ado About Nothing doesn’t do much to prove his haters wrong. As an actor, he simply didn’t have the gravitas yet to pull off this fiendish role, so this version is more radiant and alive when he’s not onscreen. It is probably just as well his character doesn’t have many words.

GIFs are a cheap way to critique a performance. After all, acting is a complicated, arduous discipline that shouldn’t be reduced to easy laughs drawn from a few seconds of film played on a loop. Then again …

This really does sum up Reeves’s unsubstantial performance as Jonathan Harker, whose new client is definitely up to no good. Bram Stoker’s Dracula is a wonder of old-school special effects and operatic passion — and it is a movie in which Reeves seems wholly ill at ease, never quite latching onto the story’s macabre period vibe. We suspect if he could revisit this role now, he’d be far more commanding and engaged. But in 1992, he was still too much Ted and not enough anything else. And Reeves knew it: A couple years later, when asked to name his most difficult role to that point, he said, “My failure in Dracula. Totally. Completely. The accent wasn’t that bad, though.” Well …

One of the perks of being a superstar is that you can sometimes just phone in an amusing cameo in some bizarro art-house offering. How else to explain Reeves’s appearance in this stylish, empty, increasingly surreal psychological thriller from Drive director Nicolas Winding Refn? He plays Hank, a scumbag motel manager whose main job is to add some local color to this portrait of the cutthroat L.A. fashion scene. If you’ve been waiting to hear Keanu deliver skeezy lines like “Why, did she send you out for tampons, too?!” and “Real Lolita shit … real Lolita shit,” The Neon Demon is the film for you. He’s barely in it, and we wouldn’t blame him if he doesn’t even remember it.

Reeves reunites with his Speed co-star for a movie that features a lot fewer out-of-control buses. In The Lake House, Sandra Bullock plays a doctor who owns a lake house with the strangest magical power: She can send and receive letters from the house’s owner from two years prior, a dashing architect (Reeves). This American remake of the South Korean drama Il Mare is romantic goo that’s relatively easy to resist, and its ruminations on fate, love, destiny, and luck are all pretty standard for the genre. As for those hoping to enjoy the actors’ rekindled chemistry, spoiler alert: They’re not onscreen that much together.

You have to be careful not to cast Reeves as too passive a character; he’s so naturally calm that if he just sits and reacts to everything, and never steps up, your movie never really gets going. That’s the case in this heist movie about an innocent man (Reeves) who goes to jail for a crime he didn’t commit, then plans a scam with an inmate he meets there (James Caan). The movie wants to be a little quirkier than it is, and Reeves never quite snaps to. The film just idles on the runway.

Following her acclaimed A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, filmmaker Ana Lily Amirpour plops us in the middle of a desert hellscape in which a young woman (Suki Waterhouse) must battle to stay alive. The Bad Batch is less accomplished than A Girl, in large part because style outpaces substance — it’s a movie in which clever flourishes and indulgent choices rule all. Look no further than Reeves’s performance as the Dream, a cult leader who oversees the only semblance of civilization in this post-apocalyptic world. It’s less a character than an attitude, and Reeves struggles to make the shtick fly. He’s too goofy a villain for us to really feel the full measure of his monstrousness.

Reeves isn’t the first guy you’d think of to head up a Bad News Bears–style inspirational sports movie, and he doesn’t pull it off, playing a gambler who becomes the coach of an inner-city baseball team and learns to love, or something. It’s as straightforward and predictable an underdog sports movie as you’ll find, and it serves as a reminder that Reeves’s specific set of skills can’t be applied to just any old generic leading-man role. The best part about the film? A 14-year-old Michael B. Jordan.

Filmmaker David Ayer has made smart, tough L.A. thrillers like Training Day (which he wrote) and End of Watch (which he wrote and directed). Unfortunately, this effort with Reeves never stops being a mélange of cop-drama clichés, casting the actor as Ludlow, an LAPD detective who’s starting to lose his moral compass. This requires Reeves to be a hard-ass, which never feels particularly convincing. Street Kings is bland, forgettable pulp — Reeves doesn’t enliven it, getting buried along with the rest of a fine ensemble that includes Forest Whitaker, Hugh Laurie, and a pre-Captain America Chris Evans.

In post-Matrix mode, Reeves tries to launch another franchise in a DC Comics adaptation about a man who can see spirits on Earth and is doomed to atone for a suicide attempt by straddling the divide twixt Heaven and Hell. That’s not the worst idea, and at times Constantine looks terrific, but the movie doesn’t have enough wit or charm to play with Reeves’s persona the way the Wachowskis did.

Reeves’s alienlike beauty and off-kilter line readings made him an obvious choice to play Klaatu, an extraterrestrial who assumes human form when he arrives on our planet. This remake of the 1950s sci-fi classic doesn’t have a particularly urgent reason to exist — its pro-environment message is timely but awkwardly fashioned atop an action-blockbuster template — and the actor alone can’t make this Day particularly memorable. Still, there are signs of the confident post-Matrix star he had become, which would be rewarded in a few years with John Wick.

Reeves flirts with Michael Douglas territory in this Eli Roth erotic thriller that’s not especially good but is interesting as an acting exercise. He plays Evan, a contented family man with the house to himself while his wife and kids are out of town. Conveniently, two beautiful young strangers (Ana de Armas, Lorenza Izzo) come by late one stormy night, inviting themselves in and quickly seducing him. Is this his wildest sexual fantasy come to life? Or something far more ominous? It’s fun to watch Reeves be a basic married suburban dude who slowly realizes that he’s entered Hell, but Knock Knock’s knowing trashiness only takes this cautionary tale so far.

Very few people bought tickets in 1997 for The Devil’s Advocate to see Keanu Reeves: Hotshot Attorney. Obviously, this horror thriller’s chief appeal was witnessing Al Pacino go over the top as Satan himself, who just so happens to be a New York lawyer. Nonetheless, it’s Reeves’s Kevin Lomax who’s actually the film’s main character; recently moved to Manhattan with his wife (Reeves’s future Sweet November co-star, Charlize Theron), he’s the new hire at a prestigious law firm who only later learns what nefarious motives have brought him there. Reeves is forced to play the wunderkind who gets in over his head, and it’s not entirely convincing — and that goes double for his southern accent.

“You are like some stray dog I never should have fed.” That’s how Rupert’s older hippie pal, Carla (Amy Madigan), affectionately refers to him, and because this teen dropout is played by Keanu Reeves, you understand what she means. In this forgotten early chapter in Reeves’s career, Rupert and Carla decide to ditch their going-nowhere Rust Belt existence by taking his dad (Fred Ward) hostage and collecting a handsome ransom. The Prince of Pennsylvania is a thoroughly contrived and mediocre comedy, featuring Reeves with an incredibly unfortunate haircut. (Squint and he looks like the front man for the Red Hot Chili Peppers.) Still, you can see signs of the soulfulness and vulnerability he’d later harness in better projects. He’s very much a big puppy looking for a home.

Every hip young ’90s actor had to get his Jack Kerouac on at some point, so it would seem churlish to deny Reeves his opportunity. He plays the best pal/drinking buddy of Thomas Jane’s Neal Cassady, and he looks like he’s enjoying doing the Kerouac pose. Other actors have done so more indulgently. And even though he’s heavier than he’s ever been in a movie, he looks great.

Keanu isn’t quite as bad in this as it seemed at the time. He’s miscast as a tortured war veteran who finds love by posing as the husband of a pregnant woman, but he doesn’t overdo it either: If someone’s not right for a part, you’d rather them not push it, and Keanu doesn’t. Plus, come on, this movie looks fantastic: Who doesn’t want to hang around these vineyards? Not necessarily worth a rewatch, but not the disaster many consider it.

The other movie where Keanu Reeves plays a former quarterback, The Replacements is an adequate Sunday-afternoon-on-cable sports comedy. He plays Shane, the stereotypical next-big-thing whose career capsized after a disastrous bowl game — but fear not, because he’s going to get a second chance at gridiron glory once the pros go on strike and the greedy owners decide to hire scabs to replace them. Reeves has never been particularly great at playing regular guys — his talent is that he seems different, more special, than you or me — but he ably portrays a good man who’s had to live with disappointment. The Replacements pushes all the predictable buttons, but Reeves makes it a little more enjoyable than it would be otherwise.

A very minor but sporadically charming bauble about a radio soap-opera scriptwriter (Peter Falk) who begins chronicling an affair between a woman (Barbara Hershey) and her not-related-by-blood nephew on his show — and ultimately begins manipulating it. Tune in Tomorrow is light and silly and harmless, and Reeves shows up on time to set and looks extremely eager to impress. He blends into the background quietly, which is probably enough.

This Lawrence Kasdan comedy — the first film after an incredible four-picture run of Body Heat, The Big Chill, Silverado, and The Accidental Tourist — is mostly forgotten today, and for good reason: It’s a farce that mostly features actors screaming at each other and calling it “comedy.” But Reeves hits the right notes as a stoned hit man, and it’s amusing just to watch him share the screen with partner William Hurt. This could have been the world’s strangest comedy team!

This Rob Lowe hockey comedy is … well, a Rob Lowe hockey comedy, but we had to include it because a 21-year-old Reeves plays a dim-bulb, good-hearted hockey player with a French Canadian accent that’s so incredible that you really just have to see it. Imagine if this were the only role Keanu Reeves ever had? It’s sort of amazing. “AH-NEE-MAL!”

An oddly curdled comedy about two wedding guests (Reeves and Winona Ryder) who have terrible attitudes about everything but end up bonding over their universal disdain for the planet and everyone on it. That sounds like a chore to watch, and at times it is, but the pairing of Reeves and Ryder has enough nostalgic Gen-X spark to it that you go along with them anyway. With almost any other actors you might run screaming away, but somehow, in spite of everything, you find them both likable.

The first film from 20th Century Women and Beginners’ Mike Mills, this mild but clever coming-of-age comedy adaptation of a Walter Kirn novel has Mills’s trademark good cheer and emotional honesty. Reeves plays the eponymous thumbsucker’s dentist — it’s funny to see Keanu play someone named “Dr. Perry Lyman” — who has the exact right attitude about both orthodontics and life. It’s a lived-in, funny performance, and a sign that Keanu, with the right director, could be a more than capable supporting character actor.

Aziz Ansari’s feature directorial debut is a mixed bag, but the one thing that’s absolutely right about it is the casting of Reeves as Gabriel, a just-okay angel who wants to do more than the menial task he’s been given of stopping dumb humans from texting while driving. And so he interferes in the life of Ansari’s struggling film editor, hoping to give him a reason to keep living. That plan goes badly, resulting in Gabriel being banished to Earth to reside among us mortals. Reeves has the perfect little twinkle in his eye as this well-meaning angel, but the actor is especially endearing once Gabriel has to get used to being a flesh-and-blood person. Watching Reeves dig on cheeseburgers and fall in love with dancing is to be reminded how giddily kid-like he can be even now at 61. We mere mortals are so lucky to have him around.

This Nancy Meyers romantic comedy was well timed in Reeves’s career. A month after the final Matrix film hit theaters, Something’s Gotta Give arrived, offering us a very different Keanu — not the intense, sci-fi action hero but rather a charming, low-key love interest who’s just the supporting player. He plays Julian Mercer, a doctor administering to shameless womanizer Harry Sanborn (Jack Nicholson), who’s dating a much younger woman (Amanda Peet), who just so happens to be the daughter of a celebrated playwright, Erica (Diane Keaton). We know who will eventually end up with whom in Something’s Gotta Give, but Reeves proves to be a great romantic foil, wooing Erica with a grown-up sexiness the actor didn’t possess in his younger years. We’re still not sure Meyers got the ending right: Erica should have stuck with him instead of Harry.

This is the only movie that Reeves has directed, and what does it tell us about him? Well, it tells us he has watched a ton of Hong Kong action movies and always wanted to make one himself. And it’s pretty good! It’s technically proficient, it has a straightforward narrative, it has some excellent long-take action sequences (as we see in John Wick, Keanu isn’t a quick-cut guy; he likes to show his work), and it has a perfectly decent Keanu performance. We wouldn’t call him a visionary director by any stretch of the imagination. But we’d watch another one of these, definitely.

Le Chevalier Raphael Danceny is merely a pawn in a cruel game being played by Marquise de Merteuil and Vicomte de Valmont, so it makes some sense that the young man who played him, Keanu Reeves, is himself a little outclassed by the actors around him. This Oscar-winning drama is led by Glenn Close and John Malkovich, who have the wit and bite to give this 18th-century tale of thwarted love and bruised pride some real zest. By comparison, Danceny is practically a boy, unschooled in the art of manipulation, and Reeves provides the character with the appropriate youthful naïveté. He’s not a standout in Dangerous Liaisons, but he acquits himself well — especially near the end, when his blade fells Valmont, leaving him as one of the unlikely survivors in the film’s ruthless battle.

In this incredible showcase for Robin Wright, who plays a woman navigating a constrictive, difficult life with more grace and intelligence than anyone realizes, Reeves shows up late in a role that he’s played before: the younger guy who’s the perfect fit for an older woman figuring herself out. He hits the right notes and never overstays his welcome. As a romantic lead, less is more for Reeves.

If you were an uptight suburban dad, like Steve Martin is in Ron Howard’s ensemble comedy, your nightmare would be that your beloved daughter gets involved with a doofus like Tod. Nicely played by Keanu Reeves, the character is the embodiment of every slacker screwup who’s going to just stumble through life, knocking over everything and everyone in his path. But as it turns out, he’s a lot kinder and mature than at first glance. Released six months after Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Parenthood showed mainstream audiences a more grown-up Reeves, and he’s enormously appealing — never more so than when advising a young kid that it’s okay to masturbate: “I told him that’s what little dudes do.”

A very lovely and sad movie that’s nearly forgotten today, Permanent Record, directed by novelist Marisa Silver, features Reeves as the best friend of a teenager who commits suicide and, along with the rest of their friends, has to pick up the pieces. For all of Reeves’s trademark reserve, there is very little restraint here: His character is devastated, and Reeves, impressively, hits every note of that grief convincingly. You see this guy and you understand why everyone wanted to make him a star. This is a very different Reeves from now, but it’s not necessarily a worse one.

Just as Reeves’s reputation has grown over time, so too has the reputation of this loopy, philosophical crime thriller. Do people love Point Break ironically now, enjoying its over-the-top depiction of men seeking a spiritual connection with the world around them? Or do they genuinely appreciate the seriousness that director Kathryn Bigelow brought to her study of lonely souls looking for that next big rush — whether through surfing or robbing banks? The power of Reeves’s performance is that it works both ways. If you want to snicker at his melodramatic turn, fine — but if you want to marvel at the rapport his Johnny Utah forms with Patrick Swayze (Bodhi), who only feels alive when he’s living life to the extreme, then Point Break has room for you on the bandwagon.

Before there was Beavis and Butt-Head, before there was Wayne and Garth, there were these guys: two Valley bozos who loved to shred and goof off. As Theodore Logan, Keanu Reeves found the perfect vessel for his serene silliness, playing well off Alex Winter’s equally clueless Bill. But note that Bill and Ted aren’t jerks — watch Excellent Adventure now and you’ll be struck by how incredibly sunny its humor is. Later in his career, Reeves would show off a darker, more brooding side, but here in Excellent Adventure (and its less-great sequel Bogus Journey) he makes blissful stupidity endearing.

This Sam Raimi film, with a Billy Bob Thornton script inspired by his mother, fizzled at the box office, despite a top-shelf cast: It’s probably not even the first film called The Gift you think of when we bring it up. But, gotta say, Reeves is outstanding in it, playing an abusive husband and all-around sonuvabitch who, nevertheless, might be unfairly accused of murder, a fact only a psychic (Cate Blanchett) understands. Reeves is full-on trailer trash here, but he brings something new and unexpected to it: a sort of bewildered malevolence, as if he’s moved by forces outside of his control. More of this, please.

Gus Van Sant’s landmark drama is chiefly remembered for River Phoenix’s nakedly anguished performance as Mike, a spiritually adrift gay hustler. (Phoenix’s death two years after My Own Private Idaho’s release only makes the portrayal more heartbreaking.) But his performance doesn’t work without a doubles partner, which is where Reeves comes in. Playing Scott, a fellow hustler and Mike’s best friend, Reeves adeptly encapsulates the mind-set of a young man content to just float through life. Unlike Mike, he knows he has a fat inheritance in his future — and unlike Mike, he’s not gay, unable to share his buddy’s romantic feelings. Phoenix deservedly earned most of the accolades, but Reeves is terrific as an unobtainable object of affection — inviting, enticing but unknowable.

Years later, we still contend that Speed is a stupid idea for a movie that, despite all logic (or maybe because of the utter insanity of its premise), ended up being a total hoot. What’s clear is that the film simply couldn’t have worked if Reeves hadn’t approached the story with straight-faced sincerity: His L.A. cop Jack Traven is a ramrod-serious lawman who is going to do whatever it takes to save those bus passengers. Part of the pleasure of Speed is how it constantly juxtaposes the life-or-death stakes with the high-concept inanity — Stay above 50 mph or the bus will explode! — and that internal tension is expressed wonderfully by Reeves, who invests so intently in the ludicrousness that the movie is equally thrilling and knowingly goofy. And it goes without saying that he has dynamite chemistry with Sandra Bullock. Strictly speaking, you probably shouldn’t flirt this much when you’re sitting on top of a bomb — but it’s awfully appealing when they get their happy ending.

This film’s casting director said she cast Reeves as one of the dead-end kids who learn about a murder and do nothing “because of the way he held his body … his shoes were untied, and what he was wearing looked like a young person growing into being a man.” This was very much who the early Reeves was, and River’s Edge might be his darkest film. His vacancy here is not Zen cool … it’s just vacant, intellectually, ethically, morally, emotionally. Only in that void could Reeves be this terrifying. This is definitely a performance, but it never feels like acting. His magnetism was almost mystical.

If they hadn’t killed his dog, none of this would have happened. Firmly part of the “middle-aged movie stars playing mournful badasses” subgenre that’s sprung up since Taken, the John Wick saga provides Reeves with an opportunity to be stripped-down but not serene. He’s a lethal assassin who swore to his dead wife that he’d put down his arms — but, lucky for us, he reneges on that promise after he’s pushed too far. Whereas in his previous hits there was something detached about Reeves, here’s he locked in in such a way that it’s both delightful and a little unnerving. The 2014 original was gleefully over-the-top already, and the sequels have only amped up the spectacle, but his genuine fury and weariness felt new, exciting, a revelation. Turns out Keanu Reeves is frighteningly convincing as a guy who can kill many, many people.

In hindsight, it seems odd that Keanu Reeves and Richard Linklater have only worked together once — their laid-back vibes would seemingly make them well suited for one another. But it makes sense that the one film they’ve made together is this Philip K. Dick adaptation, which utilizes interpolated rotoscoping to tell the story of a drug cop (Reeves) who’s hiding his own addiction while living in a nightmarish police state. That wavy, floating style of animation nicely complements A Scanner Darkly’s sense of jittery paranoia, but it deftly mimics Reeves’s performance, which seems to be drifting along on its own wavelength. If in the Matrix films, he manages to defeat the dark forces, in this film they’re too powerful, leading to a pretty mournful finale.

“They had written something that I had never seen, but in a way, something that I’d always hoped for — as an actor, as a fan of science fiction.” That’s how Reeves described the sensation of reading the screenplay for The Matrix, which had been dreamed up by two up-and-coming filmmakers, Lana and Lilly Wachowski. Five years after Speed, he found his next great project, which would become the defining role of his career. Neo is the missing link between Ted’s Zen-like stillness and John Wick’s lethal efficiency, giving us a hero’s journey for the 21st century that took from Luke Skywalker and anime with equal aplomb. Never before had the actor been such a formidable onscreen presence — deadly serious but still loose and limber. Even when the sequels succumbed to philosophical ramblings and overblown CGI, Reeves commanded the frame. We always knew that he seemed like a cool, left-of-center guy. The Matrix films gave him an opportunity to flex those muscles in a true blockbuster.

Grierson & Leitch write about the movies regularly and host a podcast on film. Follow them on Twitter or visit their site.

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Tim Grierson,Will Leitch

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October 18, 2025
Several schools in the DC area make US News & World Report best high schools list – WTOP News
U.S. News & World Report is out with its 2025 ranking of the nation’s best high schools, and one Virginia high school made the top 10.
U.S. News & World Report is out with its 2025 ranking of the nation’s best high schools, and one Virginia high school made the top 10.

Schools making the honor roll in our area include Alexandria’s Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, ranked No. 5 nationally and No. 1 in Virginia. It’s also the 5th ranked STEM school in the nation. Following controversial changes to its admissions policy in 2021 to boost diversity, Thomas Jefferson slipped out of the the top 10 nationally in 2023.

Langley High in McLean and Woodson High School in Fairfax also ranked in the top five in the state.

As for Maryland, U.S. News ranked Baltimore’s Eastern Technical No. 125 nationally and No. 1 in the state. Other standout high schools in the state include Walt Whitman (#2), Wootton (#3), Poolesville (#4) and Winston Churchill (#8) — all in Montgomery County.

In D.C., BASIS DC was ranked No. 139 nationally. Benjamin Banneker Academy High School was ranked No. 178 nationally. In the city, the top-ranked school this year is the School Without Walls, a public magnet high school in Foggy Bottom.

The top three high schools in the nation:
1. BASIS Tucson North, Tucson, Arizona
2. Signature School, Evansville, Indiana
3. Central Magnet School, Murfreesboro, Tennessee
The top three charter schools:
1. BASIS Tucson North, Tucson, Arizona
2. Signature School, Evansville, Indiana
3. The Albuquerque Institute of Math and Science, Albuquerque, New Mexico
The top three science, technology, engineering & math (STEM) schools:
1. High Technology High School, Lincroft, New Jersey
2. BASIS Chandler, Chandler, Arizona
3. BASIS Peoria, Peoria, Arizona
The U.S. News Best High Schools rankings evaluate data from over 24,000 public high schools across the country. About 18,000 of those schools were ranked based on six key factors — college readiness, state assessment proficiency, state assessment performance, underserved student performance, college curriculum breadth and graduation rate.

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Alan Etter

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August 20, 2025
Ronnie O’Sullivan: Seven-time world champion withdraws from Northern Ireland Open due to medical reasons

Ronnie O’Sullivan has pulled out of the Northern Ireland Open, having already withdrawn from the British Open and Wuhan Open in recent weeks; Seven-time world champion last featured at the English Open in September

Last Updated: 20/10/24 11:00pm

Ronnie O’Sullivan withdrew from the Northern Ireland Open ahead of his first round match

Seven-time world champion Ronnie O’Sullivan has withdrawn from the BetVictor Northern Ireland Open due to medical reasons, the World Snooker Tour (WST) has announced.

O’Sullivan was due to face Long Zehuang in the last 64 in Belfast on Monday afternoon, but announcement from WST on their website confirmed he had pulled out of the event.

China’s Long receives a bye to the last 32, with the tournament at the Waterfront Hall in Belfast running until October 27th.

Ronnie O’Sullivan has now withdrawn from three consecutive events due to medical reasons

O’Sullivan hasn’t featured since being knocked out of the first round of the English Open last month after a shock defeat to He Guoqiang, where he describing his performance as “awful” and “embarrassing”.

It is the third consecutive tournament that O’Sullivan has withdrawn from, having also skipped the British Open and Wuhan Open in recent weeks. He is next due to feature at the International Champions event in China from November 3-10.

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Ronnie O’Sullivan says if the World Snooker Championship was relocated to Saudi Arabia then he would find the tournament more convenient as a player

Ronnie O’Sullivan says if the World Snooker Championship was relocated to Saudi Arabia then he would find the tournament more convenient as a player

Trump makes winning start in Belfast

World No 1 Judd Trump began his title defence with a 4-0 win over Ishpreet Singh Chadha needing just 49 minutes to whitewash his opponent with the aid of breaks of 72, 65 and 112.

“It was easy to get up for this event,” said Trump, who has won the event four times in the last six years. “Certain venues seem to be made for snooker. Anyone who has played in the semis or final at the Waterfront [Hall] knows how special it is.

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“It’s similar to Alexandra Palace or the Tempodrom in terms of the size of the crowd and the way people react. I thrive on that atmosphere with people enjoying themselves. It helps me show off and play my best shots.”

Trump will face Matthew Selt in the last 32 after Selt defeated Lyu Haotian 4-1, while World Championship runner-up Jak Jones beat Alexander Ursenbacher 4-0 and Zhou Yuelong recovered from 3-1 down to oust Dominic Dale 4-3.

Northern Ireland’s Jordan Brown suffered a 4-2 defeat to Robert Milkins, while 18-year-old Stan Moody made breaks of 108 and 105 before beating Ryan Day in a decider.

Louis Heathcote also came through in a decider in a scrappy contest against former world champion Mark Selby, whose 81 in the first frame was the only break over 50 by either player.

Stuart Bingham beat Scott Donaldson 4-1 in a similarly low-scoring contest, while China’s Pang Jungxu made a break of 98 in the decider as he beat compatriot Yuan Sijun 4-3.

Sky Sports+ has officially launched and will be integrated into Sky TV, streaming service NOW and the Sky Sports app – giving Sky Sports customers access to over 50 per cent more live sport this year at no extra cost. Stream The new EFL season, Test cricket and more top sport with NOW.

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October 20, 2024
John Higgins becomes second snooker player to make 1,000 career centuries in defeat at English Open

John Higgins reaches 1,000 career centuries but is knocked out of the English Open; Ronnie O’Sullivan is the only other player to have reached the four-figure century milestone

Last Updated: 19/09/24 11:36pm

John Higgins became only the second snooker player to reach 1,000 career centuries

John Higgins became only the second snooker player to reach 1,000 career centuries despite crashing out of the English Open in Brentwood.

The 49-year-old Scot achieved the milestone with breaks of 108 and 105 in the third and fifth frames of his quarter-final clash against Mark Allen.

But it was not enough to seal a win that would have boosted his hopes of staying in the top 16 as Allen – who hit a century of his own in the opening frame – held firm in a gruelling decider to edge a 4-3 win.

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Ronnie O’Sullivan is the only other player to have reached the four-figure century milestone, having done so in the final frame of his 2019 Players Championship final win over Neil Robertson.

Earlier, Judd Trump set up a quarter-final clash with China’s Wu Yize after hitting back from behind to claim a 4-2 win over Fan Zhengyi.

The world No 1 nudged one closer to joining O’Sullivan and Higgins in the thousand-century club as he reeled off a break of 101 in the course of winning three frames in a row to extend his winning run.

Mark Selby held his nerve to carve out a 4-3 win over Si Jiahui and book a last-eight meeting with India’s Ishpreet Singh Chadha, who also overcame a final frame decider against China’s He Guoqiang.

Anthony Joshua’s heavyweight showdown with Daniel Dubois takes place on Saturday September 21 live on Sky Sports Box Office. Book Joshua v Dubois now!

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September 19, 2024
Rankings the Last 6 Sixers’ Opening Day Rosters – Philadelphia Sports Nation

After Jimmy Butler left, the Sixers have had a tough time building a roster worth of a championship. Between striking out on free agents to players holding out, there has not been much luck coming their way. Let’s take a look at how the opening day rosters stack up against each other after Butler’s departure.

6.

2021-2022

Record: 51-31, 4th in East

Roster: Danny Green, Seth Curry, Tobias Harris, Joel Embiid, Tyrese Maxey, Andre Drummond, Georges Niang, Furkan Korkmaz, Matisse Thybulle, Charles Bassey, Jaden Springer, Paul Reed, Isaiah Joe

This was a disappointing, yet inevitable, beginning to the season. After such a terrible loss to the Hawks, where Ben Simmons passes up an easy bucket against Trae Young, Simmons received so much hate from fans and media, that he couldn’t play for the team anymore. He decided to hold out for a trade.

Since Simmons held out, that really hurt the Sixers roster to start the year. They lost their all-star point guard and had to turn over the reigns to a second-year player with much to prove: Tyrese Maxey. This nonsense helped Tyrese Maxey’s growth tremendously by giving him so much playing time.

Nevertheless, Maxey was nowhere near the player he is today, and the Sixers just didn’t have enough firepower from players other than Embiid to play that well to start the season. Tobias Harris never stepped up during his career here and no other player had the talent to help out Embiid.

5.

2023-2024

Record: 47-35, 7th in East

Roster: P.J. Tucker, Tobias Harris, Joel Embiid, De’Anthony Melton, Tyrese Maxey, Danny Green, Patrick Beverly, Kelly Oubre, Jaden Springer, Paul Reed

Last year, the Sixers had to go through yet another season of conflict and strife. After just a year and a half removed from the Ben Simmons debacle, James Harden decided to hold out from the team too. This caused a lot of disdain from fans to organization and many people started to really lose interest (if they hadn’t already).

Had James Harden stayed, the Sixers would have had a pretty good supporting cast for Joel Embiid. Even though he didn’t, they played well without him, going 22-10 from October to December. Unfortunately, disaster struck in this season later when Embiid tore his meniscus.

Everyone knew they needed to get something in a trade to do damage in the playoffs, but the market did not have a big move in store for them which forced the Sixers to be compensated with draft picks and minor players. This season was over before it started just like when Ben Simmons held out.

4.

2019-2020

Record: 43-30, 6th in East

Roster: Ben Simmons, Josh Richardson, Joel Embiid, Al Horford, Tobias Harris, Matisse Thybulle, Shake Milton, Mike Scott, Kyle O’Quinn, James Ennis , Raul Neto, Furkan Korkmaz

Going into this season, the Sixers had high expectations. They have a solid core with an exciting young player in Josh Richardson to go along side of Ben Simmons, Joel Embiid, and Tobias Harris. Additionally, they just acquired Joel Embiid’s kryptonite (at the time). With Al Horford, Sixers fans imagined a dominant front court where no guard could come and score with two big men capable of scoring inside and outside of the three point line. Unfortunately, this team did not live up to expectations.

After just a few months of play, everyone realized this team didn’t fit right. They lacked perimeter scoring more than anything. Horford and Embiid took away from each other much more than they built each other up. Because of these issues, the team was forced to make many moves during the season to bolster their depleted bench and lack of scoring.

It’s important to note that this was the COVID year, but that doesn’t excuse the fact that this team had major holes and would end up getting swept by the Celtics in the playoffs.

3.

2020-21

Record: 49-23, First in East

Roster: Danny Green, Seth Curry, Tobias Harris, Ben Simmons, Joel Embiid, Dwight Howard, Mike Scott, Furkan Korkmaz, Shake Milton, Matisse Thybulle, Tyrese Maxey

After a year with lackluster shooting from the outside, the Sixers corrected that issue by signing Seth Curry and Danny Green – two players who shoot the three better than anyone they had the last year. These two can also hold their own on defense since they were only ever asked to guard the worst player. With defensive stars in Ben Simmons and Joel Embiid, it made playing defense much easier for the rest of the team. They had the 2nd best defensive rating in the league that year.

The Sixers were also excited to have offloaded Al Horford from the team and replace him with a backup-only center. He would strictly play minutes where Embiid wasn’t on the floor. While Howard boosted the teams worst trait (rebounding), he didn’t contribute much else. The Sixers rely on their centers to score, and he couldn’t do that well at all.

For the first time in a while, the Sixers finished the regular season with the number 1 seed in the Eastern Conference (this was a shortened season because of COVID as well). This gave the city some very high expectation to go deep into the playoffs.

The talent was there for this team, but mentally, Ben Simmons destroyed this team and would never be the same player again after the catastrophe in the 7-game loss to the Hawks in the postseason.

2.

2022-2023

Record: 54-28, Third in East

Record: P.J. Tucker, James Harden, Tobias Harris, Joel Embiid, Tyrese Maxey, Montrezl Harrell, Danuel House, Georges Niang, Matisse Thybulle, De’Anthony Melton.

The Sixers finally got a star guard with MVP style play. James Harden was acquired by the team the year before via trade for Ben Simmons and the city yearned for a championship after so many years of disappointment – this finally seemed like the team.

James Harden and Joel Embiid built chemistry through the latter half of the previous season and were expected to shine bright together as a dominant duo. They played very well together, but Harden’s ball dominant style presented some problems with Embiid’s incompatible similarity in his style.

Luckily, Harden invested in his relationship with Tyrese Maxey which helped Maxey develop into a better version of himself. In his third year, Maxey started developing into a very solid player. This team also had talent to get the job done, but ended up falling short yet again.

1.

Current

Record: TBD

Roster: Ricky Council IV, Andre Drummond, Joel Embiid, Paul George, Eric Gordon, Reggie Jackson, Kyle Lowry, Caleb Martin, KJ Martin, Tyrese Maxey, Jared McCain, Kelly Oubre, Guerschon Yabusele

Now, Tyrese Maxey is a bona fide star in the league. He and Embiid have great chemistry with each other and perfectly understand how to play along side the other. These two have grown so much together as a duo and have emerged as one of the best duos in the league.

Then, finally, after waiting so long for a free agent star signing, the Sixers signed Paul George to accompany Embiid and Maxey on their quest to a championship. Many teams add stars just to add a star, but in this case, Paul George also happens to fit perfectly with these two. Their play styles compliment each other very well.

The front office wasn’t finished after George, though. They also signed a power forward that will bring fire and intensity to the team. Caleb Martin will fit right into this city. He elevates his game when it matters, and plays with heart.

Also, Andre Drummond is returning to Philly, where he served as Embiid’s best backup just a few years ago. By signing him and bringing Lowry and Oubre back, the Sixers have some continuity from years past. These players have played together before which will only help their chances of winning this year.

Collin Benjamin

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September 17, 2024
2024 blockbuster sequels, ranked by how they justify their existence

In Hollywood, the question “Does this movie franchise need another chapter?” seems to have a pretty easy answer: “Sure, if we think it’ll still make money!”

For fans of a given franchise, though, the calculations are more complicated. Will that new installment in a movie series actually add anything worthwhile to the story, or just undermine the franchise’s original successes? Do we actually want to know more about our favorite characters, or will prequels and spinoffs ruin them? Do we have any reason to believe the latest movie using a familiar IP has a reason to exist that isn’t entirely mercenary? Will it at least be some big dumb fun?

While plenty of 2024’s would-be IP blockbusters have shifted to 2025 dates, the year so far has still seen its share of sequels, prequels, and spinoffs. So we’re running the numbers, ranking the year’s latest-in-a-series movies by how well they justify their existence — both as movies, and as installments in ongoing stories.

16. The Strangers: Chapter 1

Image: Lionsgate Films/Everett Collection

A remake of 2008’s home-invasion horror movie The Strangers wasn’t necessary, but it could have been good: With a premise as solid gold as “masked strangers break into a remote home and kill the couple vacationing there,” there are a million different takes that could have been great horror fodder that doesn’t follow the original movie beat for beat. Unfortunately, that’s exactly the uninspired approach director Renny Harlin (Die Hard 2) takes with this movie, the first in a planned trilogy that was originally written as one massive four-hour-plus movie, until Legendary Entertainment broke it down into chunks.

This new batch of Strangers movies is meant to follow the characters in the aftermath of this initial home invasion. But it kicks off with Harlin essentially remaking the first Strangers with less style and dread. Gone is the slow creepiness of the original movie, replaced by rushed horror sequences and a few moments of lackluster action. While it’s possible that parts 2 and 3 somehow redeem the kickoff, Chapter 1 is nothing more than a significantly worse retread of an effective shocker. —Austen Goslin

Image: Columbia Pictures/Everett Collection

Madame Web is only loosely connected to Sony’s already loosely connected universe of Marvel characters. Ironic, given that the tagline “Her web connects them all” was the central focus of all the teasers. The one thing this offers to longtime fans of the current live-action Spider-Man narrative is a tease about Peter Parker’s existence — something that’s always been a big question mark in the Sony Marvel movies. Paramedic Cassie Webb (Dakota Johnson) is friends with Peter’s (hot, young, not yet dead in a morally instructive way) Uncle Ben, after all! Except the film never actually acknowledges that Ben’s newborn nephew is Peter Parker, to the point where holding back on that detail becomes something like a bit. It’s almost pandering, but not indulgent enough to feel fulfilling at all.

With its stilted dialogue and nonsensical plot, Madame Web is not a good movie at all. At least it’s the sort of terrible movie that’s fun to watch in a group setting, while making jokes and tuning out the slower bits? It’s more or less Cats for superhero fans. —Petrana Radulovic

Photo: Sony Pictures

This sequel to a sequelish reboot brings the new generation of Ghostbusters (Paul Rudd, Carrie Coon, Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace, etc.) back to New York, and brings back the original characters (Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson, Annie Potts, etc.) for more than a glorified cameo. That might be enough to make it essential for superfans, but for everyone else, it’s a nostalgic callback to the original movie with not much new or engaging to make it stand out, apart from Grace’s character’s maybe-queer storyline with a cute ghost girl. —PR

Image: Universal Pictures / Everett Collection

No one in the Despicable Me movies seems to age. Former supervillain Gru (Steve Carell) looks just like he did in the first movie, and so do his daughters, who have been children for 14 years now. And yet somehow, Gru and his wife Lucy (Kristen Wiig) pursued a relationship, got married, and had a baby. So at least there’s some sense of time passing, even if it seems like Gru Jr. might be an infant for the next decade of sequels.

Despicable Me 4 contributes a few fun new world-building elements to the franchise, though it unfortunately doesn’t explore them enough to make them significant. Still, some of them could set the stage for future adventures. (A whole school for villains?) This installment also adds a small but absolutely hilarious detail to Gru’s past, a backstory involving a high school talent show and the song “Karma Chameleon.” Nothing about Despicable Me 4 is essential, but it’s cool to see a few more funky details about this broadly defined world. —PR

Image: Columbia Pictures/Everett Collection

The fourth entry in the series Michael Bay inadvertently kicked off with his directorial debut Bad Boys back in 1995 brings back a lot of cast members — chiefly the Bad Boys themselves, Will Smith and Martin Lawrence. But the filmmakers clearly think Bad Boys fans want a lot more continuity than that. Screenwriters Chris Bremner and Will Beall do their best to build a Fast & Furious-style Bad Boys universe out of every bit of character work and villain lore they can scrap together from the previous three movies.

That isn’t a compliment. Where so many blockbuster movies suffer because the studio is trying to launch a profitable franchise instead of telling a decent story, Ride or Die assumes viewers are coming to the theater armed with nostalgia and a detail-oriented fascination with lore, rather than just wanting to see a couple of gifted comedic actors mouth off at each other between frenetic action sequences. Fans who care deeply about the posthumous legacy of Joe Pantoliano’s character, this is your movie. But mostly, the franchise-building gets in the way of the fun. —TR

Image: 20th Century Studios

Fede Álvarez’s 2024 installment in the Alien franchise is almost perversely defined by how much it copies from past Alien movies, and how little it adds to the canon: Álvarez and co-writer Rodo Sayagues can’t even conjure up their own catchphrase, and fall back on having a new character echo the series’ most famous line.

The film is effectively creepy as a stand-alone, and for viewers who’ve never seen an Alien movie, this might all be new, exciting horror fare. But it’d still come across as a bit underexplained, since this film is aimed directly at people who know the franchise forward and backward. It’s a greatest-hits montage, more or less: Remember how creepy Xenomorphs are in water? Let’s do that again. Chestbursters, facehuggers, Giger-esque genital imagery, evil androids suborning ships for the company — that was cool! More of that! And so forth. It’s a good time at the movies, but it could hardly be less essential. —TR

Image: 20th Century Studios

The fourth in the new-era Planet of the Apes movies (and the 10th Apes movie if you batch them all together) doesn’t add much to the franchise’s ongoing narrative — it jumps the story forward in time about 300 years for a story that’s frustratingly half-baked and surprisingly familiar from the previous entry, War for the Planet of the Apes, but with a gorilla dictator running a forced work camp instead of a human one. There are some powerful ideas at work — that history repeats itself, that communities are stronger than individuals, and that those communities need to band together to resist tyrants — but they aren’t communicated particularly clearly, especially since they’re mixed in with other threads, about a personal journey undercut by every Kingdom ad, and about the unreliability and unknowability of humanity.

Kingdom is enjoyable enough in the moment, an action blockbuster with impressive visual effects and some appealing characters. It isn’t a bad or boring entry in the series. It just never feels essential, or like it’s doing much besides echoing more propulsive, dynamic earlier entries in this run at the Apes story. —TR

Image: Warner Bros. Pictures

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire feels like the movie where the new MonsterVerse franchise hit its stride. While 2014’s Godzilla lightly parodies disaster movies and 2017’s Kong: Skull Island does the same for dark war movies, Godzilla x Kong is a buddy movie about a giant ape and a nuclear lizard who don’t like each other much, but are often forced to team up to fight bigger monsters. It’s inescapably dumb and uncomplicatedly entertaining.

But what makes this franchise especially fun right now is that it has a secret weapon: television. While the big screen is reserved for silly monster brawls, the MonsterVerse’s TV show, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, is a much more reserved, character-focused family drama that feels like an old-school adventure movie with giant monsters thrown in. It’s an excellent counterbalance to the silly fun of movies like A New Empire, with the added bonus that the movie’s story likely means Kong will be in the show’s next season. The MonsterVerse is a strange franchise, but as long as every entry keeps proving itself entertaining, it’s awfully hard to complain. —AG

Image: Universal Pictures/Everett Collection

The adventures of panda kung fu master Po (Jack Black) could’ve been wrapped up in the series’ third installment back in 2016, but Kung Fu Panda 4 adds a bit of a postscript. The door is now open for another unlikely hero to take over the franchise, should DreamWorks decide to go that route: Basically, Po will eventually retire from his title as the Dragon Warrior, and a protégé will take up the mantle. (That definitely isn’t how it worked in the first movie, but I digress.) His heir apparent, the sneaky, thieving fox Zhen (Awkwafina), is actually a pretty cool character. I wouldn’t be too mad seeing more of her!

For the fourth movie in an animated series, Kung Fu Panda 4 is decently enjoyable, mostly suffering from wasted potential. But the fight scenes are still cool, and the humor is funny enough, even if it never reaches the highs of the originals. —PR

Image: 20th Century Studios/Everett Collection

The First Omen is a complicated addition to this list. On the one hand, it isn’t necessary, really. And its worst moments come at the close of the movie, when the implied connections to the original film series are made even more explicit than they already were. The First Omen does, however, earn its place on this list via an entirely different version of this metric: It might just be the best movie in the Omen series, which makes it a necessity by default.

Even better, by making a movie this scary, director and co-writer Arkasha Stevenson (Brand New Cherry Flavor) actually retroactively improves the rest of Damien’s story, just by making his origins this disturbing. The First Omen is simply an excellent horror movie, and that’s more than we can say for most franchise entries on this list, which is exactly why it clawed its way near the top. —AG

Image: Netflix

Netflix’s animated Ultraman movie isn’t following a strict franchise continuity like so many of the sequels, prequels, and spinoffs in this ranking. Instead, it’s part of a sprawling history of anime, manga, comics, books, live-action movies and shows, and much more, many of which reinvent the tokusatsu hero in radically different ways. This particular installment also focuses far more on repackaging Ultraman for a new generation than on tapping into or expanding his existing lore. In this case, its value to the franchise isn’t additive, it’s introductory: This is a fine, accessible place for new and younger viewers to step into the story, especially if they happen to be fans of creative, dynamic animation. Longtime Ultraman fans won’t learn anything radically new here, but they will get a perfect launch point for the next generation of fans. —TR

Image: Disney/Pixar

Pixar’s sequel to 2015’s Inside Out is the definition of a sequel expanding on a previous movie, sometimes to a fault. The first movie goes inside the head of 11-year-old Riley to explore how her personified emotions interact with each other; the sequel ages her up to 13, introduces new emotion characters, and shoves her into a series of new, anxiety-related decisions. In a lot of ways, this is a more-of-the-same sequel, leaning on a similar “important characters lost in the back of Riley’s brain, other characters taking over at center stage” plot, and plenty of the same corny-to-clever puns about how familiar thoughts, emotions, or related structures might manifest as landscape features.

But the way it recognizably tells a story about the same central characters, while focusing on how profoundly time and the events of the last movie changed them, is unusual for an animated sequel. (We’re side-eying you right now, eternally-suspended-in-time Despicable Me franchise.) Inside Out 2 forwards Riley’s evolution in meaningful ways, even if that does raise some bigger questions about the rules of this particular world. —TR

Photo: Gareth Gatrell/Paramount Pictures via Everett Collection

You’d have to go back a few years to Dan Trachtenberg’s Predator franchise movie Prey to find a prequel that feels as vital, engaging, and meaningful to a film series as A Quiet Place: Day One — and it’s notable that both movies get to that point the same way. They both keep continuity with the stories they’re setting up, but neither one is trying to dole out unnecessary series lore, or explain things that never needed explaining: They’re both just telling riveting action stories in an established setting, and shifting focus to completely different characters with their own unique dynamics.

Most disaster movies in this vein (whether they’re alien-invasion-focused or not) center on survivors. Writer-director Michael Sarnoski tunes in on someone who doesn’t have survival as an option: Sam (Lupita Nyong’o) is in the last weeks of a fatal illness, and when killer aliens start raining from the skies and chumming New York City and anyone in it who makes a noise, it’s barely moving up the time table on her mortality. Sarnoski gives her a perversely meaningless goal — to get across town to her favorite pizza place and enjoy a final slice before she dies — and then spends half the movie on taut, tense alien-stalking scenes, and the rest on exploring why she’s so doggedly determined to do this one last thing before she goes. The focus on her combination of fatalism and obsession makes Day One an indelible story that expands the Quiet Place franchise in the best way possible, without piling on a bunch of extra, unnecessary world-building. —TR

Photo: Jay Maidment/20th Century Studios

Deadpool’s third live-action adventure, and his first under the Disney-Marvel Studios banner, certainly earns high rankings for popularity: It has broken records on its way to the top of the box office. But more significantly for the purposes of this particular ranking, it pushes Deadpool’s story forward, to the extent that anything really means anything in a Deadpool movie. Death certainly doesn’t. It’s possible that MCU canon does. Narrative rigor and character continuity don’t — but who goes to a Deadpool movie for those?

The snark is tamer and less transgressive this time out, but the Deadpool & Wolverine movie is still ambitious about expanding the character’s reach into new arenas, from bringing in the Loki series’ Time Variance Authority as villains to letting him beg for a shot at joining the Avengers. You can really feel producer-star Ryan Reynolds, his co-writers, and director Shawn Levy leveraging the Deadpool franchise’s popularity to get their hands on any property they want, from gleefully defiling the end of 2017’s Logan to lining up cameos designed expressly for in-the-know comics fans. They hop around Marvel movie continuity, grabbing and dropping whatever they want like nerdy magpies, and the movie is more fun for it. Most franchise filmmakers could only dream of this kind of freedom and access. Say what you want about the recent movie-multiverse boom — at least one franchise is just using it to create a bigger, more colorful sandbox. —TR

Image: Warner Bros. Entertainment/YouTube

Furiosa is the rare prequel that feels not just equal to the hit movie it’s setting up, but like it adds vital context rather than gilding the lily. Conceived and written at the same time as Max Max: Fury Road so it would be consistent with that film’s story and characterization, Furiosa doesn’t unnecessarily just fill in how-did-this-character-get-here blanks, it tells its own distinct story and answers questions about who Fury Road’s most compelling new character is, and why she’s Max’s equal. More importantly, though, it’s wildly entertaining in its own right. —TR

Photo: Warner Bros. Pictures

The second half (or with luck, middle third) of Denis Villeneuve’s Dune adaptation has an advantage no other movie on this list has: It isn’t just an adjunct to other movies, it’s the vital continuation of an opening-act movie that was mostly setup, building to this payoff.

Even leaving aside the compelling performances and visuals, the epic warfare, and the fascinating shift in perspective — which is to say, leaving aside the fact that it’s one of 2024’s best movies so far — Dune: Part Two would top this list purely because it’s an essential part of its franchise’s story. It doesn’t just contribute new things to a franchise, it’s a cornerstone of the story Villeneuve is still hoping he’ll get to tell more of someday. —TR

Tasha Robinson

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August 20, 2024
‘Alien: Romulus’ and the ‘Alien’ Movie Rankings

‌Sean is joined by Chris Ryan to react to a handful of casting tidbits (1:00), before digging into the newest installment in the Alien franchise, Alien: Romulus (11:00). They discuss the new movie’s fealty to the original, the chances it takes, how it works as a pure horror movie, and more. Then, they rank all nine movies in the franchise (53:00), before Sean is joined by Romulus director Fede Álvarez to talk about making a movie in the franchise that he is a superfan of, some of the particular choices made around fan service, how he approached practical effects during the production, and more (1:11:00).

Host: Sean Fennessey
Guests: Chris Ryan and Fede Álvarez
Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner

Subscribe: Spotify / Apple Podcasts / Stitcher / RSS

Sean Fennessey

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August 16, 2024
‘House of the Dragon’ Season 2 Power Rankings: The Red Sowing

House of the Dragon is back, and the Dance of the Dragons is underway. The Targaryen war of succession will come down to control—who can control their impulses, their sycophants, and, yes, their dragons. With each passing episode, The Ringer will examine how Westeros’s key players are aligning their pieces on the board. As the saying goes, chaos can be a ladder. Welcome to the House of the Dragon power rankings.

The penultimate episode of House of the Dragon’s second season, “The Red Sowing,” is pretty much made for power rankings. Every episode of Dragon and Game of Thrones is ultimately about power, but this one presents its power dynamics more clearly than most. Often, in this franchise, shifts in standing are communicated subtly, with words or a glance. Other times, though, characters convey dominance or obeisance with an unmistakable, full-body display—the human equivalent of a dog rolling over, vulnerable belly to the sky.

I’m talking, of course, about bending the knee.

Early in Episode 7, newly minted dragonrider Addam of Hull bends the knee to Rhaenyra. “You kneel quickly for a man so suddenly elevated,” she says—wary, but eager to add to her air power.

Later, at Harrenhal, Willem Blackwood brags, “They who bent the knee to the usurper have been brought to heel.” Then he bends the knee to his new liege lord, Oscar Tully … who promptly orders his execution. Willem is still doing a deep knee bend as Daemon cuts off his head.

Finally, Vermithor and Silverwing bend their knees, and their necks, to Hugh and Ulf, respectively. (Dragons do have knees, right?)

All of which reminded me (sorry) of something Donald Trump Jr. recently said about conservative media mogul Rupert Murdoch. “There was a time where if you wanted to survive in the Republican Party, you had to bend the knee to him or to others,” Trump Jr. told Axios earlier this month. “I don’t think that’s the case anymore.”

Even if Murdoch is no longer kneel-worthy, Trump Jr.’s preferred running mate for his father, JD Vance, gave his first post-nomination interview to a Murdoch-owned outlet, Fox News. Vance’s, well, sudden elevation prompted numerous mentions of knee-bending by political pundits, such as this one by New York Times columnist David French: “Trump loves it when his previous critics bend the knee, and few people have bent the knee more deeply than Vance.”

A decade ago, most of America was blissfully ignorant of everything Trump Jr. said. But there’s no way he would’ve used the specific phrase “bend the knee” on, say, the last season of The Apprentice in 2010, right? Game of Thrones didn’t premiere until 2011. And seemingly thanks to Thrones (and, perhaps, A Song of Ice and Fire), these days, everybody “bends the knee.”

Thrones has long been a staple of political discourse. (If you think Vance’s stances have been divisive, check out what one of the Democratic VP hopefuls just said.) But it’s not just the political class that’s newly enamored of this saying. The culture’s increasing knee-diness is evident in this graph from the Google Books Ngram Viewer, which displays data through 2019:

Search traffic tells the same story, via Google Trends:

What if we compare “bend the knee” to a similar phrase?

Kissing the ring is out. Bending the knee is in. (By the way, if you’re wondering why “kiss the ring” popped in 2012, you can credit DJ Khaled. That 2017 spike for “bend the knee” was all Jon and Dany.)

George R.R. Martin didn’t come close to coining “bend the knee,” the way that he seems to have coined, say, the specific phrase “sweet summer child” (with its modern meaning of “naïve”). But he’s certainly made us say it much more often. Words are wind—another phrase Martin has seared into our brains—but wind can fan a fire, and every reference to knee bending reminds us that the world has collectively bent the knee to Martin’s (and HBO’s) creations. Which is, after all, why you’re reading these words … which are supposed to be about ranking characters.

1. Rhaenyra Targaryen

In a single episode, Rhaenyra doubled the number of dragons at her disposal on Dragonstone. And we’re not talking tiny ones, like Daeron’s dragon, who reportedly took wing this week in Oldtown. These are combat-ready, adult dragons, including one who’s almost as massive as Vhagar (and may be more fierce). Before receiving these reinforcements, Rhaenyra said, “I have only Syrax who may give Aemond a second thought.” But by the end of the episode, Rhaenyra has more dragons than she knows what to do with, and Aemond and Vhagar are forced to turn tail.

Not only did Rhaenyra assemble enough riders to turn Dragonstone into a no-fly zone for Team Green and potentially establish air superiority over the mainland, she did so by addressing another longstanding deficiency: her subpar political instincts. This week, she showed some serious savvy and spine by ignoring the naysayers—including Bartimos Celtigar, the dragonkeepers, and her own son and heir—recognizing the merits of Mysaria’s suggestion, and making Vermithor come when she called. She overcame her own prejudices in the interest of expediency and showed an unsuspected knack for pregame pep talks. Clear eyes, full hearts, quick fuse!

On top of all that, Rhaenyra—unbeknownst to her—gained the allegiance and swords of the Riverlords, who supported her despite Daemon’s attempt to soft-launch himself as king. Perhaps her troubles with her coup-curious consort are coming to an end. Plus, she got to meet some of her extended family! Sadly, most of her relatives’ visits didn’t last long. Family gatherings can be so incendiary. This one wasn’t heartwarming, but it was, well, warm.

2. Bastards

Episode 7 was quite a come-up for bastards, one of Westeros’s traditionally downtrodden groups. As a bastard born myself, I salute the ascendance of my fellow out-of-wedlock kids; Addam, Hugh, and Ulf may be illegitimate, but they proved that they’re legit. Even if Rhaenyra was just grinning and bearing the bastards in her midst, they came up clutch enough that the queen couldn’t front about the bastards bailing her out. Who knew that in this war among the highborn, the baseborn would prove so pivotal? (Other than millions of readers of Fire & Blood.)

Of course, things didn’t go great for every bastard: In Westeros, events that start with “The Red” and end with “-ing” must be bad news for someone. As is often the case, the sowing wasn’t so bad, but the reaping was a problem.

Me sowing: Haha fuck yeah!!! Yes!!

Me reaping: Well this fucking sucks. What the fuck.

— The Golden Sir (@screaminbutcalm) March 12, 2019

If I have any critique of Rhaenyra, who was Reaganing this week, it’s that the bastard barbecue in the Dragonmont may have been avoidable. I couldn’t help but notice that she and her retinue got well out of range of Vermithor’s flames before Silver Denys’s ill-fated dragon-taming attempt. Why not send out the aspiring dragonriders one by one to decrease casualties and increase the chances of a successful bonding, instead of making them cluster together for maximal collateral damage and then barring their escape? I don’t expect Rhaenyra to care about the bastards’ well-being, but you’d think she’d care about upping the odds of finding a match.

3. Hugh Hammer

How Hugh like me now? When this episode started, Hugh was an unpaid contractor in King’s Landing, bereaved and bereft. Now he commands the baddest dragon on Team Black, if not in all the land. Unlike Ulf, he looks the part of a dragonlord, but he didn’t master Vermithor just by being a nepo baby with the right Valyrian midi-chlorian count. He won his dragon—and, perhaps, his fortune—by being bold and courageous. “I have to do something!” he exclaimed. Well, that was certainly something. His next chat with Kat should be a fun one.

4. Addam of Hull

“We spent the whole of our lives in the shadow of the Sea Snake’s great castle,” Addam complained last week. Now he has his own room in an even greater castle. Corlys said it: “How you have come up in the world.”

Addam doesn’t just have a way with Seasmoke; he also has a way with words. As the first of the non-Targaryens to claim a dragon, Addam had the toughest time convincing Rhaenyra of his intentions. But by pledging his loyalty and bending his knee, he opened the queen’s closed mind to the possibility of “an army of bastards.” “The order of things has changed, Your Grace,” Mysaria says to Rhaenyra. This Ad(d)am actually changed the hierarchy of power.

Pulling off the “impossible” stunt of claiming a dragon—and being rewarded with a sweet cloak, plus some time off work—was nice enough. But after last week’s lament about the Sea Snake—“Me he ignores … as he always has”—you know that “Well done” from Daddy was the greatest prize of all. Hey, people have probably done more dangerous things for parental approval.

5. Ulf the Dragonlord

So, Ulf wasn’t just boasting about being the blood of the dragon for the free drinks. Yes, he had to be peer pressured into leaving King’s Landing, and sure, he covered himself in mud more than glory when he accidentally stumbled into Silverwing’s lair. But Baelon’s sot of a son—at least, he’s believed to be Baelon’s—is now a genuine dragonrider who ends the episode by soaring over the city where he once huddled among the smallfolk. It’s a pleasure to see someone flying just for fun, for once.

It’s nice work if you can get it. Still, it’s sort of a letdown that you evidently don’t have to do anything to claim a dragon. Hugh, at least, stood up to Vermithor and faced his dragon down. Ulf literally falls down in front of his dragon, yet Silverwing accepts him. I know Silverwing is laid-back by dragon standards, so maybe she sees the more mellow Ulf as a kindred spirit, but shouldn’t claiming a dragon be like breaking a horse or taming an ikran—a task that requires some skill or bravery? I guess it’s sort of a soulmate thing, but the bond would be more meaningful to me if it had to be built up over time or earned through an act that revealed the rider’s character. And shouldn’t you have dragonriding lessons before you go joyriding—kind of uncontrollably, to be fair—over Blackwater Bay? How much art is there to dragonriding, really?

That nitpick aside: There’s undoubtedly an art to depicting dragons on-screen, and the combination of HBO’s budget and its VFX artists’ skill made this episode a masterstroke in that respect. And though there’s only so much depth to the dragonseeds, the series has made major strides toward rectifying the first season’s lack of lowborn characters.

6. Mysaria

So, uh … are Mysaria and Rhaenyra going to talk about that (truly) spontaneous face-sucking sesh from last week, or are they just going to pretend it didn’t happen? Granted, these two have many matters other than making out on their minds. But if Mysaria thought Rhaenyra looked good with a sword at her side last week, you can’t tell me that the sight of the queen cowing a dragon and intimidating Aemond didn’t do it for her.

Whether or not Rhaenyra and Mysaria smooch again, Mysaria has once again demonstrated her platonic utility to the queen and solidified her status as Team Black’s most valuable adviser. You have to hand it to her: Keeping track of fourscore Targaryen progeny—some of whom don’t look at all like typical Targaryens—is a nifty feat of sleuthing and surveillance. It’s not like she has 23andMe.

7. Oscar Tully

Well, now we know how House Tully has kept the factious Riverlords in line: by applying a deft diplomatic touch that young Oscar seems to have inherited. Lord Oscar isn’t quite as precocious as Lady Lyanna Mormont, but he seems like an old hand at reading a room of proud rivermen. In private, he professes uncertainty about whether his vassals will heed his authority, but once the spotlight is on him, he performs flawlessly while projecting a winsome humility that the Targaryens lack. He even audaciously dresses down Daemon to his face, in front of a noble audience, knowing that Daemon can do nothing if he wants to walk away with a win.

“I hope to begin well, and go on from there,” Oscar tells his bannermen. Well, the beginning is going great. Why can’t Oscar be king? Can we get this kid a dragon?

8. Alyn of Hull

Addam is a dragonrider; might Alyn possess that power, too? He doesn’t know, nor does he care to find out. “I am of salt and sea,” he says when Corlys implies that maybe both of his bastard sons could bolster Rhaenyra’s dragon depth chart. “I yearn for nothing else.” You have to respect someone who understands their strengths and knows what they want in life, but even if he’d rather do his job in the background, Alyn’s low-profile life is probably behind him.

9. Corlys Velaryon

Corlys is Rhaenyra’s hand, so in general, events that help her also help him. And in this case, his sons are instrumental to her success—though he hasn’t publicly acknowledged them as his sons. Maybe it’s High Tide—er, high time—that he did. Rhaenys is dead, and Laenor’s long gone; now that Rhaenyra is indebted to Addam and Alyn and the Targaryens’ bastards have been brought into the fold, what reason does he have to hide them? “The Sea Snake would sooner have High Tide claimed by the sea than call us his sons,” Alyn told Addam last week. That was before Addam mounted a dragon and Alyn smuggled two other future riders to Dragonstone. Come on, Corlys: Let the father-son bonding begin.

10. Jacaerys Velaryon

Jace has been a voice of reason and an effective emissary for the blacks, even when Rhaenyra was rudderless, but their roles reverse this week when his mom’s new plan puts him on tilt. I get it: All that talk about bastards, and the sight of so many dragonseeds who look more quintessentially Targaryen than he does, are dredging up some insecurities. So is suddenly finding his dragon so outclassed. Pouting isn’t a good look on him, but hopefully it’s healthy that he and his mother had the Harwin talk; sometimes it’s good to get these things out there.

Perhaps Jace is right to be skeptical; we’ll see whether Rhaenyra’s pride goes before a fall. But Jace: You have to win the war before you stress about succession. Also, the smallfolk are saving your side’s ass, yet you’re calling underprivileged people “mongrels”? Come on, man. This is the Dance of the Dragons, not Project 2025.

11. Daemon Targaryen

Daemon accomplished his mission—uniting the Riverlands—but he did so, inadvertently, by uniting the region against him. He also suffered the indignity of a tongue-lashing from a whelp of a lord Daemon had dismissed in their last meeting. And then he dispensed “justice” by murdering a man for following his own orders.

Willem’s bloody demise extended a violent motif from this season. The first episode started with giving head and ended with taking one. In Episode 2, Jaehaerys’s killer, Blood, got caught head-handed, then had his head bashed in. In Episode 4, Daemon envisioned beheading young Rhaenyra. And this week, he decapitated Blackwood, who was doing Daemon’s bidding. By swinging his sword, Daemon tacitly admits that he deserves death.

“I don’t need their love,” Daemon says. “I need their swords.” Unlike Oscar, he doesn’t realize that gaining the former might make obtaining the latter more likely—or that people fight harder for causes they care about. However, he does show some signs of growth. In his latest Harrenhal hallucination, Daemon visits Viserys as an old man. “You always wanted it, Daemon,” the decrepit king says, holding out his crown clasped in one bony hand. “Do you want it still?” To his credit, Daemon doesn’t take it. Maybe he’s ready to give up the ghost, so to speak, and rededicate himself to supporting Viserys’s rightful heir.

12. Larys Strong

Larys showed a lousy nose for news in dismissing Ironrod’s intel about Seasmoke’s new rider—unless he’s trying to sabotage Aemond—but who wants to be the bearer of bad whispers, anyway? The real problem for Larys isn’t one whiff on a whisper; it’s that he’s hitched his star to a king who hardly has the will to live. Having been rebuffed in his bid to be Aemond’s hand, Larys pivoted to currying favor with the nominal monarch, whom he thinks will welcome his help adjusting to a less mobile life. Now his own survival and advancement depend on Aegon’s—hence the strict regime Larys has prescribed in his informal capacity as the king’s drill sergeant/personal trainer/physical therapist. I see the vision, but I’m not sure Larys picked the right pupil. He does lend a hand to Aegon in this episode, but it could be awhile before Aegon is in any kind of condition for him to serve as one.

13. Grand Maester Orwyle

Orwyle has little power, per se, but he’s a healer—and in wartime, those are much in demand. I don’t see why he has to take orders from Larys, though, so he should probably put his foot down. Larys tends to respond to that.

14. Aegon Targaryen

The good news is that the king is conscious and semi-ambulatory. The bad news is that he doesn’t want to be. Also, he has to be hidden away, lest his not-so-loving subjects see how weak and disfigured their monarch has become. The greatest indignity, though, is that he takes a spill during physical therapy because his cane cracks. Aegon styles himself King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, and Protector of the Realm. Is a solid walking stick too much to ask?

15. Aemond Targaryen

Tough look for ~~my guy~~ One-Eye. Not only is his brother (slowly) on the mend, endangering his regency, but his Small Council is much smaller than usual. Worst of all, he’s no longer invincible on Vhagar, whose Swiss-cheese wings and wattle are making her look a little old. Until this week, the blacks could’ve triple-teamed Vhagar and still stood to lose, so great was Vhagar’s size and strength advantage over any of Rhaenyra’s individual dragons. But even Vhagar wouldn’t survive a six- or seven-on-one attack—especially not with Vermithor, who’s nearly as large, in the mix. With her revamped roster, Rhaenyra could put the Vhagar Rules into effect while holding a dragon or three in reserve. As his 180 at the end of this episode shows, Aemond knows it. If he nears Dragonstone, he’ll be at great risk … but if he flies anywhere else in the realm, he’ll leave the city exposed.

16. Alicent Hightower

“Nothing is clean here,” Alicent says, staring at a rat that looks at home in her chambers. It can’t have helped that her son had the ratcatchers killed … but who bears more blame for Aegon’s ascent to the throne than Alicent? It would seem that the list of things that aren’t clean includes the dowager queen’s conscience, and understandably so.

In an effort to cleanse that much, at least, Alicent goes glamping in the Kingswood with Rickard Thorne and tries to wash away her sins. When she emerges from the figurative baptism, she finds she’s in no rush to return to court. When Thorne—who seems a little less enthused about this outdoors adventure—asks, more or less, when she means to release him from roughing it, Alicent answers, “I’m not yet certain I do.”

At least Alicent got some screen time this week, unlike estranged slam piece Criston Cole, who’s missing in action. (I can’t say that I missed the man.) She’s plummeting in the power rankings; if she falls much further, she might cease to merit Kingsguard protection, and she’d have to go glamping alone. But her demotion would be worth it if it came with a corresponding drop in the misery rankings. Maybe this dark night of Alicent’s soul will be for the best: Hasn’t she done enough damage, to Westeros and herself? If proximity to the crown is crushing, as Daemon’s vision of Viserys says, then Alicent is probably better off away from the rats and the rat race.

T-17. Baela and Rhaena Targaryen

“It must be the dragon who speaks,” Rhaenyra says in Episode 7. Evidently it mustn’t be either Baela or Rhaena who speaks, because neither of them had a line this week. At least Rhaena is hot on Sheepstealer’s trail, not that Team Black seems to need more dragons right now. Back in Episode 6 of Season 1, Rhaena griped, “Father ignores me.” Good news: If Addam of Hull’s example is any guide, there’s no better way to get a distant dad’s attention than to claim a dragon. Then again, in that same Season 1 episode, Rhaena’s late mother told her, “If you wish to be a rider, you must claim that right.” So maybe Rhaena’s doing it aaaall for ~~Leyna~~ Laena.

19. King’s Landing Security

First, Daemon sneaked into King’s Landing and hired assassins to kill a member of the royal family within Maegor’s Holdfast. Next, Rhaenyra herself sneaked into the sept to see Alicent, right under the noses of the dowager queen’s guards. Now 80 dragonseeds have sneaked out of the city at Rhaenyra’s behest. By contrast, it took an identical twin of a Kingsguard member for the greens to (briefly) breach the blacks’ defenses. Granted, it’s easier to lock down Dragonstone than the capital city, but is there no limit to the incompetence of King’s Landing security and counterintelligence? I’d say “heads must roll,” but as we established, a lot of heads have rolled already.

20. Hugh’s Daughter

Farewell, Whatever Your Name Was. I’ll miss the mopping of your feverish brow, but I guess you died on the way back to your home planet. I’m sorry that the lettuce Hugh stole last week wasn’t enough to sustain you.

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Ben Lindbergh

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July 30, 2024
Every Lady Gaga Song, Ranked

Over the years, Gaga’s shape-shifting has painted a collective portrait of a complex, restless, fearless woman.
Photo: Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images

*This article was originally published in November 2018. It has been updated to include subsequent releases. Lady Gaga’s Jazz and Piano residency at Park MGM runs through July 6, 2024.

Although Lady Gaga has been a household name for more than a decade, the first half of her career still feels as daring, vital, and relevant as ever. From her 2008 debut, The Fame, to 2014, when the ARTPOP-hype bubble burst, Gaga sped through several careers’ worth of highs, lows, and controversies. Each release became an event; her every move was dissected by social media. Gaga’s imperial phase was such a whirlwind that, in hindsight, it feels as if we’ve yet to take the collective time to reflect on the full depth of her artistry. Looking back on her first four albums — The Fame, The Fame Monster, Born This Way, and ARTPOP — her sheer ambition was dizzying. No pop star of the 2010s was more committed to achieving transcendence through her art. She almost single-handedly raised the bar for pop music, videos, fashion, and live performances.

But the comedown, if you can call it that, was fascinating in its own way. Since Cheek to Cheek, 2014’s duet album with Tony Bennett, we’ve witnessed a gradual unraveling of Gaga’s once messianic image. She was superwoman no longer, and 2016’s Joanne allowed her to be more vulnerable, to find a sense of equilibrium in her art.

Lady Gaga has influenced several generations of weird, countercultural, often LGBTQ+ pop stars — everyone from Lorde to Sia, Nicki Minaj, Charli XCX, Halsey, Troye Sivan, SOPHIE, Janelle Monáe, Billie Eilish, Lil Nas X, and Dua Lipa owes Gaga some debt. Ironically, the sound of Gaga’s iconic dance-pop hits fell completely out of fashion alongside the moody, trap-tinged, playlist-centric downturn of late-2010s pop. But seemingly through sheer force of will, 2020’s Chromatica channeled four decades of house-music history to reclaim Gaga’s dance-pop throne for the first time since 2013.

Since then, she has stayed busy — releasing the future-house Dawn of Chromatica remix album, leading the charge on Love for Sale (Tony Bennett’s final record and set of live performances after his Alzheimer’s diagnosis), and holding both pop and jazz-piano residencies in Las Vegas.

It’s true that sometimes the dazzling, attention-seizing provocateur who gave us the VMAs meat dress and vomit art feels like a distant memory. Then she’ll go and do something like almost single-handedly carrying the quarantine-era 2020 VMAs or stealing the show in Ridley Scott’s House of Gucci, and you’ll remember — she’s still Lady Fucking Gaga.

Over the years, Gaga’s shape-shifting has painted a collective portrait of a complex, restless, fearless woman. In every guise, she’s given it her all. No artist is completely original, but time has proven Lady Gaga sui generis. There’s no question that she’s an all-timer. What will she do next? Your guess is as good as hers.

This list is less about judging Lady Gaga’s catalogue than making sense of the recent past — much of which we’ve already forgotten! It includes every commercially released studio track and her more significant featured credits. That gives us 136 songs, with fewer stinkers than you’d expect, and a top 70 that could rival any pop star’s catalogue. No list can represent every fan’s opinion, but I’ve tried my best to rank her songs (along with her more impactful videos) based on their emotional, autobiographical, and cultural significance. Disagree? To quote the Lady herself: “I stand here waiting for you to bang the gong / To crash the critic saying, ‘Is it right or is it wrong?’”

The great Christmas songs balance joy and melancholy. “Christmas Tree,” on the other hand, is so tongue-in-cheek that it immediately collapses under its own weight. Less a song than a gag, every individual element is unpleasant: single-entendre lyrics; vocals and synths that aren’t even in the same key; and the less said about Space Cowboy’s guest verse, the better.

First heard on Lady Gaga’s Myspace page in 2006, then cut from The Fame and later issued as a digital single, “Vanity” is a forgettable glam-pop romp that just barely hints at her true potential. As Gaga told New York Magazine in 2009, while still in the early stages of her journey, “We walk and talk and live and breathe who we are with such an incredible stench that eventually the stench becomes a reality. Our vanity is a positive thing. It’s made me the woman I am today.”

This is the closest Gaga’s ever come to doing no-frills commercial R&B, but it’s far from convincing. With cliché lyrics drenched in bad auto-tune — “Would you make me number one on your playlist? / Got your Dre headphones with the left side on” — “Starstruck” felt dated almost immediately upon its release. Surprisingly, Flo Rida’s guest verse over-delivers.

Included on international editions of The Fame, this Prince-inspired strut feels like a sketch that never develops past its title.

With its stabbing, yet melodic strings, this is the third and last of Chromatica’s classical interludes. But at 28 seconds, it’s a mere intro to “Sine from Above,” and the only interlude that doesn’t dazzle on its own.

Gaga’s fourth-best song with fashion in its title actually suits Heidi Montag better. Gaga playacts at the song’s narcissism, but Montag lives it.

Tony Bennett chastises a former lover while Gaga provides a cheeky running commentary. It’s worth a laugh, but their rendition of this old standard is too fast, lacking anything except humor. Everyone from Frankie Lymon to Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, and Rosemary Clooney has recorded more definitive versions.

Written about her brief, fruitless first record deal with Def Jam, the titular “paper gangsta” refers to L.A. Reid himself, who dropped Gaga after hearing her early studio recordings. To be fair, “Paper Gangsta” inspires little confidence. It might have worked as a piano ballad, but Gaga half-raps, half-sings the verses without committing to either, and her flow is as awkward as the auto-tune it’s lathered in.

A RedOne production with a lot of “Poker Face” DNA, but far less of its charm.

There are no bad versions of this Christmas standard, and this duet with Tony Bennett is fun — but Gaga sings the verses with an odd, brassy accent, almost as if she’s poking fun at the song a little too much.

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with this playful Joanne bonus cut — it’s just inessential. A ’70s glam-soul vamp, it’s mostly memorable for Mark Ronson’s fuzz-guitar solo tribute to Mick Ronson (no relation).

This gender-swapped electropop take on Mötley Crüe’s “Girls Girls Girls” contains the best worst lyric of Gaga’s career: “Love it when you call me legs / In the morning, buy me eggs.” This was nearly The Fame’s sixth single, until “Bad Romance” was released earlier instead. Can you imagine?

A fun but shameless disco pastiche with an unbelievably on-the-nose bridge: “We got that disco, D-I-S-C-O / And we’re in heaven, H-E-A-V-E-N!”

A blisteringly quick two-minute take on the Irving Berlin–penned standard. Tony Bennett already recorded better solo versions in both 1957 and ’87.

This is one of the more obvious, less fanciful duets on Love for Sale, Gaga’s second album with Tony Bennett. It was recorded as a tribute to Cole Porter, a giant of the Great American Songbook, and Porter’s simpler-than-usual lyric allows less room for vocal interpretation. The long exchange of guitar and piano solos, though, is a treat indeed — but it’s worth seeking out Bennett’s ’70s recording with legendary jazz pianist Bill Evans, in which their interplay is spectacular throughout.

Most of Cheek to Cheek’s best songs aren’t uptempo swing numbers, but slow, luxurious ballads. So it’s ironic that the album closes with this Duke Ellington classic, perhaps the song that embodies jazz’s big-band era. Gaga and Bennett are fine, yet a spectacular tenor sax solo outshines them both.

Written (but not used) for the musical Gypsy, “Firefly” leans more toward theater than jazz. While it’s not an easy vocal line to sing, Gaga matches Bennett note for note.

First performed by Ginger Rogers in 1937’s Shall We Dance, Ira Gershwin’s unique lyrics mix social commentary with romantic wit. Bennett and Gaga are charming enough, even if the song doesn’t lend itself especially well to duets.

Pure, sweet escapism — check out that “Heart of Glass” guitar riff, and Gaga’s unusually Gwen Stefani–like chirp. “Summerboy” closed out most editions of The Fame, but the song in no way hinted at the bigger and better things to come.

A ’50s-style country waltz that would be intolerably sappy if not for the sheer warmth of Gaga’s voice. Bradley Cooper’s rugged delivery is a little uptight, while Gaga is effortlessly soulful — sounding less like herself, and more like the gentler, less fiery Ally.

“The Queen” immediately name-checks — you guessed it — “Killer Queen,” but its poppy synth-rock sounds more like Pat Benatar. Gaga sings about self-confidence yet manages to sound less inspired than on the rest of Born This Way, and the closing guitar solo deflates the song like a balloon. Why wouldn’t you go out shredding?

A soaring Ally ballad that’s still poppy while remaining more organic than her dance tracks. To be sure, Gaga’s vocals are impressive here. Still, the song’s too underwritten to linger in the memory, and it’s barely featured in the film.

In A Star Is Born, this ballad soundtracks Jackson and Ally’s impromptu wedding, but beneath their musical declarations of love lies a thinly veiled layer of desperation. Barbra Streisand and Kris Kristofferson could have sung this to each other, but it may be too sentimental for some listeners.

In classical terms, this begins as an Adagio in D minor — a slow lament led by a solo cello, that accelerates into a chaotic swell of strings. Brief yet grandiose, it’s a perfect intro to the robotic synthpop of “911.”

Tony Bennett may be the king of the leisurely jazz vocal, but he undoubtedly undersings this version of Cole Porter’s most iconic composition. He and Gaga don’t get to interact much, and the gentle nature of their chemistry means that she can’t sell the climactic lyrics: “And its torment won’t be through / ’Til you let me spend my life making love to you!” It’s a blessing that we get to hear a nonagenarian Bennett sing at all, but he already recorded a stunning rendition of this song for 1992’s Perfectly Frank — where his delivery is so sensuous that it still has the power to make you blush.

Like all good synth-pop, “I Like It Rough” blends the human with the mechanical, though Gaga makes for an unconvincing fembot in the bridge. Could almost pass for Robyn or Goldfrapp.

One of the most live-sounding tracks on Cheek to Cheek, Bennett and Gaga’s version revs up this Fred Astaire classic, ending with a spectacular call-and-response climax: “I won’t dance! I won’t dance!!” But like many of the songs in this lower-middle section of the list, it’s enjoyable, if not as essential as Gaga’s best.

More soulful than most 2018 pop, more smoothed-out than the Gaga we’re used to. This is exactly the kind of song that’d get Ally onto countless Spotify playlists but wouldn’t quite make her a star.

The Fame is an iconic album title, but the eponymous track never really crossed over into the broader consciousness. “The Fame” is a tongue-in-cheek ode to hedonism, fueled by Gaga’s steely determination to make it to the top. Her true potential lies in the dreamy, more sincere bridge: “Don’t ask me how or why, but I’m gonna make it happen this time / My teenage dream tonight.”

This Elton John cover doesn’t quite reinvent the wheel, instead content to capture just enough of his old magic. When she sings in a low contralto, Gaga can sound like she’s doing an Elton impression — but when she leaps up an octave in the third verse, it’s breathtaking.

“Jesus is the new black!” Over thumping electropop beats, Gaga relives her New York origin story, reimagining the city’s art scene as an “underground pop civilization” led by, well, Black Jesus.

Love for Sale opens no differently than Cheek to Cheek — with Gaga introducing an evening of familiar, enthusiastic jazz standards. “It’s De-Lovely” is a delightful, rollicking way to kick off the set. This time, there’s an even stronger sense that Gaga is leading the dance, as her boisterous performance brings out the verve in Bennett.

To quote Vulture’s Nate Jones, is this song “terrible, is it a bop, or is it a terrible song that’s also a bop?” The answer is … yes. For the haters, it’s an accurate portrayal of how repetitive modern pop sounds to their ears. But for pop fans, “Why Did You Do That?” is delightfully campy. The melody evokes 2001 Jennifer Lopez, but Gaga’s diva vocals clearly outclass the material — which is why it’s so fun! “Why do you look so good in those jeans? / Why’d you come around me with an ass like that?” Who needs answers when you have rhetorical questions like that?

With its Chic bass line, chiming piano, and dazzling production, this is worlds better than 2009’s “Fashion” — yet a tad less vital than ARTPOP’s best. On Gaga’s 2013 Thanksgiving special, she performed the song with the supergroup it deserves: RuPaul and the Muppets.

First sung by Bing Crosby, “But Beautiful” might be Bennett and Gaga’s most naturalistic duet on Cheek to Cheek, as they slowly escalate over four minutes to a gentle but devastating emotional climax.

Lest we forget, Beyoncé and Gaga’s first collaboration preceded “Telephone” by four months. Neither the song, produced by Bangladesh of “A Milli” and “Diva” fame, nor the video, directed by Hype Williams, was quite as well-received as “Telephone.” But Beyoncé and Gaga clearly had chemistry, and the futuristic video was adventurous new territory for them both.

A haunting-yet-groovy blues guitar tune where Bradley Cooper and Gaga dream of romantic betrayal and its consequences: “You’ve been out all night diggin’ my grave.” Cooper’s a natural blues singer, but Gaga’s belt dominates the mix.

Ally’s first studio recording in A Star Is Born is a slice of charming if undercooked pop soul — like Duffy and Mark Ronson operating at 70 percent. It only really gets going halfway through, once Gaga leans into her higher register. Still, the song acts as a stylistic bridge between Ally’s bluesier songs with Jackson and her slick pop productions. The official video cheekily recuts the film into a romantic comedy, in case you were hoping for something more like Music and Lyrics.

A glam-rock stomper set in a little beauty shop of horrors: “Can you feel it? Looking serial killer, man is a goner.” As fun and raucous as “MANiCURE” is, the repetitive chorus doesn’t quite fulfill the promise of the rest of the song.

This song exists for one reason only: so Gaga could open the Born This Way Ball by coming out on a bionic unicorn. A Journey-like arena rock anthem, “Highway Unicorn” is the most obvious song on Born This Way, an album that’s in no way subtle.

“Grigio Girls” was written for Sonja Durham, the Haus of Gaga’s longtime managing director, who died of cancer in 2017. It’s not a pop song, just an intimate moment shared between a close group of friends, turning their tears of mourning into wine. It sounds like nothing else in Lady Gaga’s discography — so much so that it’s hard to imagine her ever writing in this mode again.

“Heaven, I’m in heaven / And my heart beats so that I can hardly speak,” sings Gaga as she opens this song, having the time of her life working with Tony Bennett. As on much of the album, Bennett plays the straight man as Gaga cheekily vamps around him.

“A man loves a triple threat … / Hair, body, face” goes this song’s fabulous chorus, which was clearly not written with Jackson Maine or any straight male audience in mind. “Hair Body Face” could plausibly have fit on The Fame, though 2008 Gaga would’ve cranked up the irony.

Lady Gaga’s voice is the first thing you hear on Cheek to Cheek — sounding familiar, yet unrecognizable in the album’s new-old setting. Longtime jazz fans might find this Cole Porter song selection overly familiar, but it’s hard not to be impressed by Gaga’s musicality.

In Bennett’s favorite song from the eponymous album, he and Gaga deliver the joyous, up-tempo big-band arrangement you’d expect — complete with an adventurous bebop sax solo. Except these are Cole Porter lyrics from the perspective of a sex worker advertising her wares! Nothing but respect for Bennett and Gaga’s sex positivity, but they don’t deliver the song with the wink it needs to go all the way. It’s fascinating, though, to hear Bennett’s 1962 version, which he belts in a sonorous tenor with pure charisma.

“I’m blonde, I’m skinny, I’m rich, and I’m a little bit of a bitch!” Gaga revisits The Fame’s hedonism with a tad more sophistication and, via Zedd, upgraded production. “Donatella” isn’t exactly deep, but Gaga makes high fashion’s possibilities feel endless, accessible to anyone.

While Gaga is a convincing jazz vocalist, her readings aren’t always subtle. On this Jimmy McHugh cover, her tone is brassy, and clearly influenced by rock singers — but more charming for it. You’d never sing an original jazz composition this way, but standards were made to be reinterpreted.

There’ve been many songs written about marijuana, but only one sung by a musical-theater kid over banging dubstep-EDM. The slowed-down, operatic bridge is magnificent: “I know that Mom and Dad think I’m a mess / But it’s alright, because I am rich as piss!”

A David Bowie pastiche that, for many, was the first sign of the depth of Gaga’s musicianship. “Brown Eyes” is a breakup piano ballad, but Gaga snarls her way through the lyrics instead of confronting the tender emotions beneath the song’s surface. “I guess it’s just a silly song about you,” she sings — but later ballads like “Speechless” would be anything but silly.

The only Lady Gaga track that dates back to her Stefani Germanotta Band years, it’s no wonder she kept this bluesy piano-rock jam — though it’s lightweight, she’s rarely sounded more effortlessly charming. “Again Again” is one of this era’s true hidden gems.

In late 2013, trap beats hadn’t fully been gentrified by pop stars, let alone teen YouTubers recording diss tracks. So “Jewels n’ Drugs” was a total curveball on a major-label pop album, even one as weird and sprawling as ARTPOP. Featuring T.I., Too $hort, and Twista, it’s a genuinely underrated posse cut — even if little of its ferocity comes from Gaga herself.

Gaga and Bennett sound young at heart in Love for Sale’s most playful duet. It’s wonderful to hear Bennett sing a 1934 composition with 2021 connotations: “But if, baby, I’m the bottom / You’re the top!” Cole Porter would be proud.

The best known song from Cole Porter’s first hit Broadway musical, 1928’s Paris, “Let’s Do It” is packed full of campy, laugh-out-loud double entendres. On this solo cut, Gaga injects plenty of humor into her reading — even if she spends a little more effort riffing on the notes than bringing out the wit in the words.

Gaga’s brassy belt brings out one of the album’s most passionate vocals from Bennett, who even lets out a spontaneous laugh toward the end of the song. There are countless recordings of this classic already, from Frank Sinatra to Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, but the Gaga-Bennett duo sounds as worthy as any.

Every beat on Born This Way hits hard, and this electro-glam metal fusion is no exception. But “Bad Kids” has a sweet, almost power-pop chorus, with Mother Monster at her most maternal: “Don’t be insecure if your heart is pure / You’re still good to me if you’re a bad kid, baby!”

The lead single from Gaga and Bennett’s second album, “Kick” is a lyric about two cynical grouches who only get joy from each other — the perfect vehicle for Gaga and Bennett’s mutual charisma. Gaga has typically been the lead on their duets, but here, Bennett pulls out his best vocal performance on the album. (He still has the power to ascend into his once iconic tenor range, though the song sounds nothing like his 1957 rendition.) The recording and music video were even nominated for three Grammys in 2022 — one last honor for a man whose career predates the awards show itself.

Hey, this isn’t jazz — it’s Cher! Funnily enough, Cheek to Cheek’s most original reading isn’t of a standard at all. Recorded live at the Lincoln Center, the band plays a bossa-nova take on the song while Gaga sings solo, wearing one of Cher’s own wigs. She mostly leans away from the song’s natural melodrama — until she belts the final verse with full diva theatrics.

A sparse piano ballad that’s more reminiscent of Adele than Lady Gaga, where Ally pledges to love Jackson until the end of her life. Like all great musicals, A Star Is Born tells its story through its lyrics — though you might not pick up every nuance in the moment. “Is That Alright?” plays during the film’s end credits, a tragic ode to future dreams that’ll go unfulfilled.

Gaga delivers this Cole Porter classic like a lullaby, indulging in the beauty of the song’s composition rather than dwelling on the lyrics’ regret. Her rendition on the Tonight Show is even gentler, and utterly mesmerizing.

At the time, “Eh, Eh” — the follow-up to “Poker Face” outside the U.S. — sounded far too saccharine for Gaga’s fame-hungry ambitions. It seemed a step backward: an Ace of Base–like bubblegum-pop track, paired with a video where she plays Italian Housewife Barbie. But aside from its production, “Eh, Eh” could pass for a ’60s girl-group song. Listening to it today, Gaga’s sincerity shines through, as she waves good-bye to a former lover while trying not to hurt his feelings.

Chromatica’s lone original bonus track is slower and less spectacular than anything on the album proper, but kind of great on its own terms. It’s carefree in sound, with echoes of Whitney Houston in the synths and Gaga’s effortless octave leap in the chorus, but desperate and confessional in its lyrics.

Joanne isn’t the album you think it is — it’s groovier, wittier. Co-written with Beck, “Dancin’ in Circles” is one of the funnier songs about masturbation ever written, though that very quality makes it a tad inessential.

This is one of the more straightforward lyrics on ARTPOP, but the track is weird as hell! Packed with twists and turns, brooding verses that explode into technicolor synth choruses, “Sexxx Dreams” embodies 2013 Gaga’s everything-but-the-kitchen-sink approach to songwriting.

Inspired by the death of Trayvon Martin, Joanne’s final track is a spiritual for the 2010s; a far cry from the fearless optimism of Gaga’s past albums. But it carries an important message: to not turn away from suffering. “Angel Down” puts into perspective the sense of death and loss that hangs over Joanne, from David Bowie and Amy Winehouse to Gaga’s aunt Joanne Germanotta. It functions as an unexpected reunion with her former producer RedOne, writing with Gaga for the first time since 2011 in a vastly different setting.

A tribute to the best parts of Jackson and Ally’s creative and romantic relationship, “Always Remember Us This Way” sounds like vintage Carole King, with a hint of modern Nashville via Gaga’s three co-writers — Natalie Hemby, Lori McKenna, and Hillary Lindsey. In the film, Jackson recruits Ally as his touring keyboard player and backing vocalist, and later encourages her to perform this, one of her original songs, as their encore. Ally succeeds spectacularly — the crowd even chants her name! But “Always Remember Us This Way” isn’t exactly a showstopper — it’s the kind of song that charms you over multiple listens with its warm, familiar delivery.

On ARTPOP, Lady Gaga embodied all of her personas at once — forcing listeners to make sense of the record’s sprawl themselves. The title track is the halfway point. A psychedelic synth journey through time and space. A question without an answer. “My artpop could mean anything,” sings Gaga — signifying what exactly?

In early 2006, Stefani Germanotta was an earnest piano-rock balladeer. By the end of the year, she’d recorded this: disco-funk via Prince and the Scissor Sisters, but hungrier and more amoral. At the time, Gaga was far from rich — but that was her motivation. Like in the world of ballroom culture, she portrayed herself as an outcast indulging in tongue-in-cheek hedonism. Produced by her early mentor Rob Fusari, “Beautiful, Dirty, Rich” perfectly encapsulates the attitude that would soon make her famous, but not the Eurodance sound … she hadn’t met RedOne yet.

Gaga’s delightful first duet with Tony Bennett came during the middle of Born This Way’s album cycle. She couldn’t have been a bigger pop star, nor, to the surprise of many, a more triumphant jazz singer. But Gaga didn’t merely pay tribute to the past; she updated a beloved standard, and held her own against the Tony Bennett — who dubbed her “America’s Picasso” in the making.

Gaga croons this Nat King Cole cover in a near whisper — the only time on Cheek to Cheek she plays it softer than Tony Bennett. It’s as sumptuous and beguiling as any version’s ever been.

“You’re just a pig inside a human body / Squealer, squealer, squeal out, you’re so disgusting,” goes the chorus of “Swine,” the most uncomfortably strange song in Lady Gaga’s discography. Incited by her sexual assault at the hands of a music producer when she was 19, “Swine” urges you to embrace your deepest, darkest feelings of revulsion. Gaga casts predatory men as swine, but by the end of the song, she unleashes the inner pig inside us all: “Paint your face and / Be a swine just for the weekend!” “Swine” spawned some truly unhinged live performances, but the studio version is so bright and polished that it’s overwhelming — much like Jeff Koons’s eye-popping ARTPOP album cover.

The follow-up single to “Poker Face,” “LoveGame” isn’t really about romance, or even sex — it’s about Gaga toying with us, her audience. It hasn’t aged as well as her other early singles, but in retrospect, its lyrics that seemed silly at the time — “disco stick,” “got my ass squeezed by sexy Cupid” — were memes-in-waiting. Gaga even began wielding a literal disco stick in live performances. The Joseph Kahn–directed music video brought Gaga’s entourage of dancers into the New York City subway, but even more impressive was her raucous performance at the 2009 MuchMusic Video Awards.

“I want your whiskey mouth all over my blonde south,” opens Gaga’s horniest song to date. Bassy synths grind like metal guitars, buzzing with desire. The song’s fantasies are autobiographical, with references to Lüc Carl, the same metal-drummer boyfriend who inspired “Yoü and I.” Gaga asks, “I could be your girl, girl, girl … / But would you love me if I ruled the world?” The price of fame is steep, but she makes it sound so much more seductive than romance.

A muscular disco-rock power ballad, “Perfect Illusion” swung for the fences, but Gaga’s vocals felt overwrought and underwritten — too melodramatic to forge a real emotional connection. The song played a pivotal part in Gaga: Five Foot Two, her 2017 Netflix documentary, where its mixed reception seemed to strike a nerve with her.

But it’s the music video that truly elevates the song. It was shot in the California desert, and Gaga’s physical contortions take on a mesmerizing beauty. Time has tempered our reactions; in hindsight, you have to respect Gaga’s audaciousness — even if “Perfect Illusion” isn’t quite the masterpiece it aspired to be.

A song about distracting yourself from heartbreak with the finer things in life, Gaga’s best studio performance on Cheek to Cheek is serene, naturalistic, and perhaps not coincidentally, solo. Recording with Tony Bennett connected Gaga to a sense of history, a lineage of great jazz performers, but it made the album less of a musical statement. Imagine a whole album of covers, even original songs, as moving as “Lush Life.”

A breezy bonus track, “Fashion of His Love” pays tribute to the late Alexander McQueen, and the near-religious experience of wearing his intricate designs. The beefed-up ’80s dance-pop track borrows more than a little of Whitney Houston’s head-in-the-clouds joy — and it even earns its surprise last-chorus key change.

“Fun Tonight” has less melodic ingenuity than Chromatica’s best, but it’s fascinating for how it reveals the inner conflict Gaga sees when she looks in the mirror. In the chorus, she declares, “I’m not having fun tonight” — toying with the irony of negative emotions on an uplifting composition. In the second verse, she even circles back to the concerns of her debut album, addressing the stans who wish she would recreate the sound of 2008: “You love the paparazzi, love the fame / Even though you know it causes me pain…” What’s disappointing is how the song concludes early, without building to a real bridge or climactic final chorus.

Like the inverse of Aqua’s tongue-in-cheek “Barbie Girl,” “Plastic Doll” takes off the armor to show a real human with real emotions, who struggles with being objectified by the public’s eye. The themes and synthpop sound are familiar, but it’s comforting to hear Gaga sing so directly about reclaiming her agency — especially after years of wrangling with the expectations put upon her by fame.

Gaga’s love of old-school, bad-boy masculinity has occasionally seemed at odds with her progressive feminist leanings. So with “John Wayne,” it was a relief to finally hear her verbalize that conflict, over a country-disco boogie worthy of Shania Twain. The Jonas Åkerlund video, too, is among Gaga’s freakiest, featuring exploding cars, neon-country dance sequences, and her playfully devilish expressions. On “Perfect Illusion,” love is tragic, but “John Wayne” at least has a sense of humor about it.

“Young, wild, American / … I might not be flawless, but you know / I got a diamond heart,” sings Gaga — rebooting her origin story on Joanne’s opening track. Gaga wrote the song while entering her 30s (still a performer at heart), and the Americana rock of “Diamond Heart” is no less a costume than any other sound she has adopted. The only problem is that the deconstructed rock-band arrangement is too stiff — where are the high hats? — and it never feels live enough to truly soar. “Diamond Heart” isn’t quite the mythological “Thunder Road” Gaga intended, but it’s still an exciting, necessary reboot.

Lady Gaga does nothing by halves — if she’s going to do a “mariachi techno-house record” about the injustices of U.S. immigration law, you’d better believe she’s going all the way. “Americano” is an initially dizzying listen, though there’s a tenderness in the eye of the storm. Said Gaga, “It sounds like a pop record, but when I sing it, I see Édith Piaf in a spotlight with an old microphone.”

Gaga clearly adores this song, as it closed out every Joanne World Tour set list. “Million Reasons” has that moving chorus, yet it’s too much of a power ballad to work as a true breakup song. Gaga’s raw vocal performance elevates it, though the lyrics and bland arrangement lack the precise, lived-in details of a truly great country song. The video shows off her rebranding as a country singer, clothed in that beautiful Joanne shade of pink.

“Million Reasons” didn’t fully come to life until her 2017 Super Bowl halftime show, where it was her lone cut from Joanne. As she sang and played piano on an elevated platform, surrounded by fans waving lights and cell phones, her latest reinvention felt complete.

This may be the most sentimental (and vibrato-dominated) vocal Lady Gaga has ever delivered on a record. Flying solo, she sings each syllable with utter precision, emotional intuition, and richness of texture — the same way a great artist adds layers to a painting. Most famously recorded by Gene Kelly, the song is a reminder that Gaga can effortlessly hang with the greats — of any generation.

Immediately after ARTPOP’s “Mary Jane Holland,” a guilt-free celebration of pot, comes this whiskey-fueled piano ballad about a codependent, borderline-toxic relationship. “I’ll hate myself until I die,” drawls Gaga — haunted by her demons, trapped by her addictions. But whenever she played “Dope” live, it became a celebration between every other fucked-up misfit in the room.

The first solo Lady Gaga song in years that felt unforced, totally unpretentious — and fun. Over Josh Homme’s offbeat slide guitars and Mark Ronson’s Stax horn arrangements, Gaga sounds like she’s having the time of her life — the perfect embodiment of her raucous, back-to-basics 2016 Dive Bar Tour.

How many pop songs open with an honest-to-God Judas Priest guitar riff? “Electric Chapel” throbs like neon synthwave with a heavy-metal edge, lighting the way to Gaga’s cathedral — her Born This Way Ball. If you’re still confused about the album’s infamous bionic motorbike cover, “Electric Chapel” should make you a believer.

“Babylon” ends Chromatica on a weird curveball of TR-909 house snares, cheesy saxophone, and a gospel choir — and it’s one of the album’s less bombastic tracks! It’s driven by a bizarre lyrical metaphor that only Lady Gaga could come up with: what if the Old Testament God’s destruction of the Tower of Babel created modern celebrity gossip culture?? “Babylon” is like a puzzle where the pieces don’t quite fit, yet Gaga’s campy delivery makes total sense: “Serve it, ancient-city style — that’s gossip!” It’s not quite the wonderland she’s searching for on “Alice,” but it’ll do.

The closest thing Chromatica has to a traditional ballad — and the Lady Gaga song that’s most fit for crying on a dance floor. Most of the album’s 4/4 kick drums pulse with a sense of liberation — these ones pound with urgency. Over mournful minor-key chords (as showcased on the album’s bonus piano demo), Gaga’s voice uplifts the listener, even as she prays for her own salvation: “Lift me up, just a small nudge / And I’ll be flying like a thousand doves.” We confront our despair alone, but we conquer it together.

The atonal, warbling vocal chop that opens this Top Gun sequel’s theme is an odd misdirect — “Hold My Hand” is a pure power ballad. Gaga takes lyrics that consist entirely of potential clichés and, through sheer vocal power and a colossal snare drum, lifts them into the stratosphere. Completely earnest in composition and production, this is one of her only pop songs with zero subversive elements. That has never been her modus operandi, which seemingly makes “Hold My Hand” an outlier in Gaga’s catalogue.

In this electropop opera, Gaga assumes the role of Mary Magdalene — “the ultimate rock star’s girlfriend” — as she forgives the world for taking her beloved Jesus away from her. “I won’t crucify the things you do … / When you’re gone I’ll still be Bloody Mary,” sings Gaga, casting Mary as a graceful, eternal icon of feminine suffering. “Bloody Mary” could be sacrilegious, but like in The Last Temptation of Christ, humanizing icons only makes them more relatable. Oh, and it helps that the track’s ruthlessly danceable, too.

The Fame Monster ends by shifting from dance-pop to this funky, soulful stomper, produced by Teddy Riley of Blackstreet fame. On the previous seven songs, Gaga confronts her fears, but by “Teeth,” she’s become ferocious in life and the bedroom: “Take a bite of my bad girl meat / Show me your teeth!” As she told MTV in 2009, “‘Show me your teeth’ means ‘tell me the truth,’ and I think that for a long time in my life that I replaced sex with the truth… You hide in the physicality of a relationship as opposed to really getting to know somebody.”

A more defiant coda to “Plastic Doll,” “Sour Candy” has a simple message — take me as I am. Blackpink’s four members get as much airtime as Gaga herself, their voices — sweet yet full of attitude — a perfect contrast to Gaga’s earthy tone. The song’s slinky modern house beat is destined to soundtrack catwalks for years to come.

In one minute, Chromatica’s orchestral intro evokes a multitude of images and emotions — windswept landscapes, the beauty of human accomplishment, the feeling of time ticking away… It’s a deeply romantic piece that feels like it was lifted from a film score or modern classical suite. But instead, as the first track on Gaga’s sixth solo album, “Chromatica I” declares her ambitions: this isn’t just any 2020 take on nostalgic dance-pop — it’s a work for the ages. Co-composed with Morgan Kibby, it’s as much of a Lady Gaga song as any vocal track.

A tribute to Marilyn Monroe and other women who influenced politicians in the bedroom, peaking with Gaga’s incredible spoken bridge: “Put your hands on me / John F. Kennedy / I’ll make you squeal baby / As long as you pay me.” “Government Hooker” would be the perfect soundtrack for a military-industrial-themed fashion show on Mars, with buzz-saw synthesizers as sharp as Gaga’s prosthetic cheekbones.

“Scheiße” has a faux-German hook that’s as nonsensical as it is catchy, but the song’s message is crystal clear: “If you’re a strong female / You don’t need permission.” It’s impossible to hear this and not want to strut down a catwalk in oversize platform heels.

“Til It Happens to You” isn’t the usual fare for Lady Gaga or Diane Warren, the song’s co-writer, and author of countless love ballads. Written for The Hunting Ground, a documentary that addresses the climate of sexual assault on college campuses, Gaga’s recording pulls no punches. “Til it happens to you / You won’t know how it feels,” she sings, calling upon the full weight of her vocal abilities. Gaga delivered a heartbreaking performance at the 2016 Academy Awards, accompanied onstage by over 50 sexual-assault survivors. “Til It Happens to You” didn’t win Best Original Song, but it left a lasting impression, a year before the #MeToo movement took off.

Another Gaga solo performance recorded live from Lincoln Center, she delivers this Pal Joey show tune with breathtaking, intimate understatement. At her best, Gaga has all the wit, humor, and precise emotional control of the great jazz vocalists. She’s never been so charming while doing so little — the audience hangs on every word.

ARTPOP, as misunderstood now as it was upon its release, is a work of science fiction. If Born This Way was about learning to love yourself, ARTPOP imagined the Gaga-ified utopia we could live in. “Venus” opens by quoting Sun Ra, the iconic jazz Afrofuturist, then blasts off through the solar system in search of sexual liberation: “Uranus / Don’t you know my ass is famous?” Why can’t all pop be this unapologetically freaky?

In the 2017 documentary Gaga: Five Foot Two, Gaga struggles to perform at a high level while managing chronic pain. She witnesses her dear friend Sonja Durham’s battle with cancer; and she prioritizes her career over love, ending her engagement with actor Taylor Kinney. “The Cure,” at first, may sound like any other top-40 pop song, but it deals with the same emotional burdens as the film. Gaga’s never sounded this vulnerable in a pop context: “Rub your feet, your hands, your legs / Let me take care of it, babe / Close your eyes, I’ll sing your favorite song.” It’s simple, familiar, but it says everything.

Chic were never known for having diva-level singers — their vocal lines were essentially vehicles for the crisp grooves of Nile Rodgers and his band. But surprisingly, Gaga doesn’t overpower this blockbuster remake of Chic’s classic 1978 single. She fits right in, even elevating the song to new heights in all the right moments. Their version first premiered in 2015, soundtracking Tom Ford’s SS16 womenswear collection. It took three years for the full recording to get an official release, but so what? It’s every bit as timeless as the original.

Written and originally demoed by Father John Misty, “Come to Mama” feels like a lost ’60s classic — like Magical Mystery Tour via Phil Spector’s Christmas album. Mother Monster calls for peace with a firm but gentle hand — she’s no longer the messianic figure of eras past. It’s a celebration of life, and a warning of what we’d lose without love.

Short for “Girl Under You,” “G.U.Y.” is a power-bottom anthem fueled by Zedd’s vicious, stuttering groove. Like Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill,” Gaga dreams of reversing the roles in her relationship: “I don’t need to be on top to know I’m worth it / ‘Cause I’m strong enough to know the truth!” Gaga only made two music videos for ARTPOP, but the seven-minute “G.U.Y.” short film was her most visually ambitious to date — cramming in snippets of “ARTPOP,” “Venus,” and “MANiCURE” as well. “G.U.Y.” went underappreciated at the time, but revisit it, and you’ll find it’s positively overflowing with joie de vivre.

Lady Gaga never met her aunt Joanne Germanotta, who was an artist and a painter, but they’ve long shared a spiritual connection. “Every part of my aching heart / Needs you more than the angels do,” drawls Gaga, like Stevie Nicks over fingerpicked guitars — old sounds that are new to her. It’s as if we’re eavesdropping on an intimate family conversation (and in a scene from Gaga: Five Foot Two where she plays the song for her grandmother, we literally do). But the song’s piano version, recorded earlier in 2018, is sparser and even more haunting. Gaga croons gently, letting the lyric speak for itself. The song ends with her acknowledging her middle name — “Call me Joanne … / XO, Joanne,” resolving the Joanne era on a peaceful note.

“I killed my former and / Left her in a trunk on highway ten,” sings Gaga, shedding Born This Way’s skin and, seemingly, much of her casual fan base. Her most sonically aggressive opening track, “Aura” blends mariachi guitars with growling, inhuman synths. But the chorus soars, seemingly foreshadowing the album to come: “Do you wanna see me naked, lover? … / Do you wanna see the girl behind the aura?”

One of Gaga’s most spiritual songs, a dreamy ode to self-love and discovery that floats on sparkling amber synths. The subject matter isn’t too far removed from “Just Dance,” really, but “So Happy I Could Die” stands on its own, feeling more like a shared moment with a friend in a club at midnight.

It’s hard to say if this should have been a far bigger hit, or if it shouldn’t exist at all. A relentlessly catchy R&B–synth-pop banger, “Do What U Want” — like Madonna’s “Human Nature” — is a statement of artistic defiance through sexual freedom: “You can’t stop my voice, ‘cause / You don’t own my life, but / Do what you want with my body.” It should have been a powerful message … but how do we reconcile that with R. Kelly’s involvement? In 2013, we should have known enough about his transgressions. By 2018, there was no excuse.

It’s uncomfortable yet undeniable that Gaga and Kelly had musical chemistry. On “Do Want U Want,” he plays his usual seductive, lecherous persona — but actually tones it down a little. The two courted attention with racy performances on SNL and at the AMAs, and a video directed by Gaga’s frequent collaborator Terry Richardson — another alleged sexual abuser — was filmed, then canceled, never to be released. A 2014 remix swapped out R. Kelly for Christina Aguilera, but wasn’t nearly as compelling. For many, “Do What U Want” symbolized everything that went wrong with the ARTPOP campaign: thrilling highs next to baffling lows. Even watching from afar, there was a cognitive dissonance to the period that felt inexplicable until years later.

It took until early 2019, after the release of Lifetime’s Surviving R. Kelly docuseries, for Gaga to address and apologize for the song, explaining regretfully, “My intention was to create something extremely defiant and provocative because I was angry and still hadn’t processed the trauma that had occurred in my own life.” She soon had the song removed from digital, streaming, and subsequent physical editions of ARTPOP. Should future generations seek out the original recording, they’ll find a song that’s an electrifying listen, but a cautionary tale, difficult to hear removed from its troubling context. There’s nothing else like “Do What U Want” in Gaga’s discography, and there never will be.

The namesake for Gaga’s Vegas residency, “Enigma” is extra euphoric even by Chromatica’s standards, but with a hi-hat driven, funkier feel than her usual fare. Its enormous hook encourages you to dream big: “We could be anything you want… / We could break all of our stigma / I’ll, I’ll be your enigma!” It’s the perfect summation of how Lady Gaga sees her role in the public eye: on one hand an eternal shape-shifter à la David Bowie, on the other, a force for radical positivity.

BloodPop and Madeon’s electropop track shifts the album into a slower gear, depicting the inside of Gaga’s brain as if it’s a sci-fi construct, where neurons fire and spark chain reactions beyond her control. “My biggest enemy is me, pop a 911,” goes the chorus, alluding to both the emergency phone number, and an antipsychotic she takes that once literally saved her life. Gaga depicts popping a pill as a mostly positive, necessary act — but every day remains a struggle. She sings most of the song with a robotic affect, but the pre-chorus is higher, more vulnerable: “Can’t see me cry ever again…” It’s every artist’s struggle: must she feel too much, or too little? The music video, by The Cell director Tarsem Singh, is her freakiest since ARTPOP — depicting Gaga in a surreal tableaux of The Holy Mountain-like imagery.

Joanne’s most cinematic song plays out like an intimate Western family drama. Gaga’s voice has never sounded smokier as she sings of her innate weakness for volatile men — and sees her struggles reflected in her sister’s and father’s relationships. If loving someone means accepting their flaws, then that makes her a sinner, too: “Hear my sinner’s prayer / I am what I am / And I don’t wanna break the heart of any other man but you …” “Sinner’s Prayer” shares surprising thematic similarities with Beyoncé’s “Daddy Lessons,” from her LEMONADE album of the same year. In both songs, each woman acknowledges their conflicted familial heritage, and finds redemption through the power of country music, the tradition at the heart of nearly all American popular song.

Lady Gaga and Florence Welch are two of modern pop’s most famous belters — so no one expected their first collaboration to be a duet so adorable it could’ve been performed by two Muppets. Over ’70s soul piano borrowed from “Bennie and the Jets,” Gaga and Welch gently exchange lines and lift each other up. It’s no motivational anthem, just a simple ode to women supporting women. “Hey Girl” is an astonishing record, a gift of pure emotional generosity.

Lady Gaga’s A Star Is Born Oscar campaign began with the film’s grand finale, a true tearjerker from the Whitney Houston playbook. Gaga embodies the five stages of grief with her whole voice and body — whether she’s cooing softly in her lower register or belting her heart out. The film version of “I’ll Never Love Again” cuts away from Ally’s climactic performance to a flashback of Jackson nervously singing the song to her for the first time. It’s an act of pure emotional manipulation on Bradley Cooper’s part as director, but it perfectly encapsulates the characters’ relationship: Jackson sees Ally’s artistic potential, but it’s she who brings it to life. “I’ll Never Love Again” sounded like nothing on the 2018 charts, but that’s why it was so powerful. It showed that Gaga could’ve been a star in any era — on a record or the silver screen.

With producer RedOne, Lady Gaga engineered a sound that would define the next five years of pop: American R&B melodies, Europop synthesizers, four-on-the-floor dance rhythms, and just a tinge of pop-punk and emo’s brattiness. In 2008, “Just Dance” seemed wildly ambitious, the first shot — and Billboard No. 1 — fired by a star in the making. A decade later, it almost sounds … humble?

Gaga hides her weirdness in plain sight here. You can hear her theater-trained vibrato in the verses, then there’s the “half psychotic, sick hypnotic” bridge, a curveball no other pop singer would’ve attempted. What few remember is Colby O’Donis’s guest verse, a series of horny-in-the-club clichés that only exists to provide a male point of view, making it more palatable for commercial radio. It shows how faceless “Just Dance” could have been if Gaga weren’t such a compelling narrator.

No pop star has made music their religion quite like Gaga does here. She enlists her friend and mentor (a very game Elton John) to lay out her spiritual worldview. “When I was young, I prayed for lightning / … Yeah, I stared / While my eyes filled up with tears / But there was nothing there.” Nothing — until she heard a sine wave (the purest form of sound) from above. Connected to that universal life force, she’s no longer afraid or unloved. “Sine From Above” is as grand a track as Gaga has ever recorded — with plucked orchestral verses and a melodic drop that hearkens back to ’90s rave, trance, and Eurodance. It all gives way to a frenetic drum-and-bass breakdown that you wish went twice as long — signifying a big bang, an explosion of energy and light, and all the untapped musical potential of Gaga’s bright future.

Better than any other songwriter, Cole Porter articulated love as a magnetic force that pulls two people together — the flirtations between them a deft tango. Tony Bennett recorded this song as a solo devotional in 1993, but on his final album, Gaga’s presence completes the pairing. Over a mid-tempo arrangement that brings out the best in each singer, they exchange the perfect lyrics to sum up their partnership: “When fortune cries ‘Nay, nay’ to me / And people declare ‘You’re through’ / Whenever the blues becomes my only song / I concentrate on you!” The music video shows another kind of love — the ability to see someone at their fullest — when an aging Bennett sketches a pencil portrait of Gaga that brings her to tears. Even more than “The Lady Is a Tramp,” “I Concentrate on You” is Gaga and Bennett’s definitive duet. Through Porter’s timeless words, Bennett defying mortality, and Gaga an even better singer than in 2013, the song makes the connection between the three feel like the miracle it is.

“Alejandro” paired one of Gaga’s catchiest pop songs with her darkest visuals. Gaga rejects a string of Latin suitors — Alejandro, Fernando, Roberto — via melodies that evoke ABBA and Madonna, over a thumping beat, like Ace of Base gone EDM. Rejection has rarely sounded so sweet. The Steven Klein–directed video, however, combines German expressionist cinema with religious and militaristic imagery. Gaga begins by mourning her dead lover, but the narrative gets increasingly inscrutable from there. It was almost too provocative — few could make sense of it all. But what is clear is this: Steven Klein’s camera adores the male body, spotlighting the dancers as much as Gaga herself. The “Alejandro” video is a tribute to queer masculinity, and the ability of marginalized people and artists to thrive under oppression.

“Just Dance” got Lady Gaga onto the charts, but “Poker Face” is where her iconography truly begins. The video opens like a horror film, as Gaga emerges from a pool in a bedazzled alien mask, drawing us into her topsy-turvy sonic world. “Poker Face” topped the Billboard charts not just because it was a strange, minor-key earworm, but because Lady Gaga was a puzzle we couldn’t figure out. Who was the “real” woman behind the poker face? We expect pop to be glittery surfaces, but here was Gaga telling us love, sex, and fame are all a performance. Live, she’d reinvent the song as a solo piano-cabaret piece, often in unglamorous radio promo settings — never playing it the same way twice. Gaga refused to be pigeonholed as an artist, or objectified as a woman in pop. With “Poker Face,” she wielded her sexuality like a weapon — not simply to please her audience, but to leave us wanting more.

“Stupid Love” is exactly what many fans have wanted (and haven’t gotten) from Lady Gaga since 2013’s ARTPOP. On first listen — which, for many, was weeks ahead of schedule thanks to a pesky leak — her sixth album’s lead single sounds like she has picked up right where she left off. But the Gaga of 2020 has nothing left to prove. Her mission is simply to uplift. BloodPop and Tchami’s production hits hard with its churning synths and 4/4 kicks, but Gaga’s vocals reach upward and outward into gospel-inflected, Whitney Houston territory. “Freak out, freak out, freak out,” she sings, building to a chorus in which each titular line ends with an exclamation point. “Stupid Love” sees Gaga back in love with the thrilling potential of the three-minute pop song: “I don’t need a reason / Not sorry, I want your stupid love!” It’s a classic disco-pop theme: Don’t think. Feel! Give in to the healing power of music. It’s no coincidence that this is her first collaboration with pop super-producer Max Martin, who leaves his mark on the song’s crisp, clear vocal melodies.

Gaga hasn’t been part of pop’s sonic vanguard since 2013, and “Stupid Love” on its own hasn’t done much to change that perception. Even the video, while flamboyant, aims more for fun than ambition. But that’s not a bad thing. “Stupid Love” is a reawakening. A rebirth in technicolor. Gaga inverts her most iconic song title, “Bad Romance.” This time as joy.

“Replay” pairs a more traditional disco groove with stark lyrics: “The monster inside you is torturing me / The scars on my mind are on replay, r-replay.” Produced by Burns, the track’s “Disco Inferno”-style octave bass builds to a chaotic swirl of voices and strings in Gaga’s mind. It’s the closest thing Chromatica has to ARTPOP’s manic highs, where the song offers no solace — the only way out is to hit next.

The Lady Gaga of The Fame seemed invincible; but a year later, on The Fame Monster, she lay her deepest fears bare. “He ate my heart and then he ate my brain,” sings Gaga in the bridge, unsure if she’s in love, or lost all control. Backed by ’80s toms and beautiful, melancholy synth chords, “Monster” is among the best pop songs ever written about losing your innocence — how sex and intimacy can feel like you’re being eaten alive.

In a much-retold story, Bradley Cooper watched Gaga perform “La Vie en Rose” at a cancer benefit in 2016, then cast her in A Star Is Born the next night. The film restages that moment for the cameras, as Jackson wanders into a drag bar where Ally happens to be singing. Gaga is magical, channeling three women at once: Ally, herself, and Édith Piaf. Gaga’s voice is deeper, more muscular than Piaf’s, but every bit as masterful in her delivery, building to an astonishingly passionate climax. “La Vie en Rose” — “life in rosy hues” — has always been more than a mere love song. It’s a tribute to the transformative power of art itself. It shouldn’t be possible to reinvent such an iconic standard, but Gaga’s rendition in A Star Is Born adds yet another layer, depicting how an artist’s drab, uninspired daily life can blossom into truly moving art.

Over a ’90s-inspired, yet timeless house strut, Gaga announces her presence: “I walk the downtown, hear my sound / No one knows me yet, not right now / But I am bound to set this feeling in motion.” She’s often revisited the self-discovery and trauma of her New York origin story in song, but it’s only now, over a decade later, that she can truly imbue her younger self with the strength she has now. In a chorus that no one else on the planet could deliver better, Gaga’s voice soars: “I’m not nothing without a steady hand… / I’m a free woman!” After the struggles of the ARTPOP period and the tentativeness of Joanne, it’s an immense relief to hear Lady Gaga sing with pure joy, the weight of the world no longer on her shoulders.

By 2011, we’d gotten used to Gaga pushing the envelope, but it’s still incredible that a song this weird was a hit: “Judas” is a work of camp, melodrama, opera, pop, dance, mythology, religion, morality, and slamming industrial beats all in one. Gaga retells the story of Judas Iscariot through the eyes of a Mary Magdalene torn between Jesus and Judas, love and temptation, aggressive verses and dazzling melodic choruses. The song’s video, which depicted Jesus and the 12 apostles as a high-fashion biker gang, was controversial upon release — but it wasn’t sacrilegious; rather, it honored the concept of religious art. Myths exist to be retold and reinvented, and by Born This Way, Lady Gaga absolutely commanded the power to do so.

On an album filled with messages of self-love and empowerment, the penultimate track found Gaga singing her first unconditional love song — a bluesy, country-rock tribute to her ex-boyfriend Lüc Carl. “There’s only three men that I’ma serve my whole life / It’s my daddy, and Nebraska and Jesus Christ” — the song’s lovestruck lyrics went a long way to humanizing Gaga. But that didn’t mean ditching the costumes: The video sees her traipsing through middle-America barns and cornfields; playing a mermaid; and assuming her drag persona Jo Calderone, which is how she opened the 2011 VMAs.

And yet, the song does have one flaw: Mutt Lange’s production. His drum track, built from an unnecessary “We Will Rock You” sample, is overly stiff and mechanical — everything that Gaga’s voice isn’t. Still, when she first premiered “Yoü and I” live in 2010, she delivered one of her rawest performances ever. Playing the piano with her band, she made the song come alive — it swung like ’70s rock and roll. Watch the video above, and you’ll never hear “Yoü and I” the same way again.

Before 2020, Lady Gaga had recorded countless dance-pop tracks, but she’d never ventured into house music, the subgenre that emerged in the black, queer Chicago scene after the heyday of disco. Her voice used to wrestle with her instrumentals, each pushing the other to an extreme. Now, her voice still soars, but on “Alice” we hear her give into the music, subsuming herself to the hypnotic beauty of a shuffling house beat. She uses her lyrics to question, not to preach. She’s not even the protagonist of this song’s story: “My name isn’t Alice / But I’ll keep looking, I’ll keep looking for Wonderland… / Could you pull me out of this alive?” Chromatica isn’t paradise; Gaga’s described its world as “not dystopian, and it’s not utopian.” Its euphoric melodies, crafted alongside her lead collaborator BloodPop are often tinged with sadness and minor chords. But “Alice” was the perfect catalyst for the 34-year-old Lady Gaga, the eternal wanderer, to rediscover herself through the dance-pop she’d steered clear of for so long.

ARTPOP was ultimately about finding grace and inspiration in chaos; embracing the 24/7 mania that comes with being a household-name pop star. “Gypsy” sounds like a tour bus barreling down a highway at breakneck speed, knowing the thrill can’t last forever. In hindsight, it was the last gasp of the first half of Gaga’s career, when the costumes were wild, EDM ruled pop, and our cultural optimism seemed boundless. Ultimately, the era’s excesses took a toll on Gaga’s mind, body, and the perception of her public persona … but “Gypsy” makes it feel like it was all worth it.

Gaga’s most explicit song about identity, “Hair” reimagines her teenage years as a kind of West Side Story musical battlefield. She struggles with her parents’ and society’s expectations, but finds liberation in the one thing that’s hers — her hair. The song is built from elements that could come off as ’80s kitsch — synth-metal riffs, broad Springsteen inflections, Clarence Clemons’s saxophone — but Gaga’s self-belief is so powerful that not one second of “Hair” feels cliché. The Fame and The Fame Monster built her an audience, but with Born This Way, Gaga chose to recast pop as a safe space for vulnerable, misfit, queer kids to find their individuality and reinvent the world in their image. Born This Way was a coming-of-age album for her fans, and “Hair” was its heart and soul.

Originally a demo written for Britney Spears, “Telephone” takes a simple premise and elevates it to high pop art: Don’t call me in the club; I’m out dancing with Beyoncé! “Telephone” is the embodiment of the pop star’s imperial phase, when they can redefine the Zeitgeist through seemingly effortless force of will. Over harps and buzz-saw synths produced by R&B legend Rodney “Darkchild” Jerkins, Gaga and Beyoncé cross paths at the perfect time — one new star on the rise, one familiar star consolidating her iconic status.

The song is inseparable from its Jonas Åkerlund–directed video, a nine-and-a-half minute “Paparazzi” sequel that riffs on revenge thrillers and pop-music tropes alike. From a women’s prison to the Pussy Wagon to poisoning an entire diner, Gaga and Beyoncé command the camera, serving look after look after look. “Telephone” is Gaga’s ultimate feminist statement: She does things her way, with no regard for the male gaze or the music industry’s gatekeepers. “Telephone” didn’t just elevate Gaga as a pop star — it made her a new American icon.

Grinding synths morph into a stadium-size riff as Gaga’s moans give way to a morbid introduction: “Silicone, saline, poison / Inject me baby / I’m a free bitch.” “Dance in the Dark” is about a woman who can only have sex with the lights off — who finds liberation, her will to live, in the darkness. The song’s spoken-word bridge evokes Madonna’s “Vogue,” but Gaga speaks to the dead, summoning her icons as ghosts that haunt our memories: Marilyn Monroe, Sylvia Plath, Judy Garland, JonBenét Ramsey, Liberace, Jesus, Stanley Kubrick, and Princess Diana. The Fame Monster track sits on the razor’s edge between glamour, tragedy, and immortality. At the 2010 Brit Awards, Gaga dedicated “Dance in the Dark” to the recently departed Alexander McQueen, in a performance that was anything but conventional. It’s criminal that this was never a true single, but maybe it was always destined to be a cult favorite.

Born This Way opens with a pilgrimage to New York City’s Lower East Side, the site of Stefani Germanotta’s rebirth as Lady Gaga. “Marry the Night” begins as a melancholy hymn that accelerates into an electro-rock opera, as Gaga romanticizes her days as a struggling artist, determined to succeed at any cost. Gaga sings of despair and glory, love and loss, until you no longer know which is which, till the song ends on synth chords that ascend like a neon-lit stairway to heaven.

“Marry the Night” went on to close the Born This Way era with one of Gaga’s most personal videos, a 14-minute epic about “one of the worst days of [her] life” — the day Def Jam dropped her from her first record deal. Gaga’s visions of couture hospital gowns, ballet, and her rebirth as a fire goddess bear no resemblance to the art she was making in 2007, but that was the point — there was no looking back.

The second single from Chromatica, “Rain on Me” articulated Gaga’s new ethos: positivity can be more healing than fighting the source of your pain. Pairing the two biggest Italian-American pop stars of today, “Rain on Me” allows both Gaga and Ariana Grande to be completely themselves. Gaga’s powerful delivery propels the track forward, but in the second verse, the production contracts to suit Ariana’s gentle coo. Among all its twists and turns, compressing the entire arc of a seven-minute classic house track into half that time, “Rain on Me” could be the most emotionally generous song Lady Gaga’s ever written. It demands nothing of the listener — it just gives and radiates love. The video, directed by Robert Rodriguez, has both women dancing through a sci-fi downpour of water and knives — not ignoring their pain, but thriving, free of inner conflict. Topping the Billboard Hot 100 for one week in June, “Rain on Me” — along with Dua Lipa’s Future Nostalgia — felt like one of the few sources of pure joy that we had during the darkest months of 2020. It’s impossible to listen to it without recalling that time; to acknowledge the losses we endured, and all the ways in which we’ve grown and healed since.

As ARTPOP’s lead single and closing track, “Applause” caps the first half of Lady Gaga’s career with a circular statement: “Pop culture was in art, now art’s in pop culture, in me!” Driven by endless variations on six looping chords, “Applause” is Gaga’s grandest moment of meta-commentary. In 2013, it seemed of a piece with the era’s EDM-pop trends, but in hindsight, this is still the most aggressively theatrical single she has ever released. Her androgynous, Bowie-esque verses. That unforgettable accelerating drum fill. The uniquely offbeat chorus. And the bridge. The highest note she’s hit on record. These were all things we’d never heard from Gaga before — or since.

The music video, directed by fashion photographers Inez & Vinoodh, is a tribute to the lifesaving joy of creative expression — packed with absurd, laugh-out-loud visual gags and artistic references. Somehow, Gaga’s live performances were even wilder: She opened the 2013 VMAs by singing “Applause” in five different costumes (each representing one of her eras) and pulled off a Wizard of Oz tribute on, of all places, Good Morning America. Later on the show, Gaga said, “All of these outfits and all of these wigs that I’ve been changing in over the years … This is my way of getting to Oz. To have all my dreams come true … Dorothy was able to transform in order to survive.” Just five years after her debut, Gaga cemented her legacy as a pop icon, and “Applause” was a large reason why.

“Speechless” had nothing to do with the Warhol-inspired Lady Gaga of The Fame, but one year later, its piano-bar confessions fit right in with the dark electropop of The Fame Monster. Written as a plea to her father, who was refusing to undergo open-heart surgery for a life-threatening condition, “Speechless” is one of pop’s great Oedipal-complex ballads. For the first time, she’s seeing her beloved, troubled parent as an equal, addressing him with the heartbroken candor of a lover. “I’ll never write a song / Won’t even sing along / I’ll never love again,” sings Gaga, so devastated that she could throw it all away. Behind every great pop song is a real well of emotion, and “Speechless” lays it all bare.

A Star Is Born’s entire narrative plays out in “Shallow,” a duet between a man who longs for change and the woman who ultimately embraces it when he cannot. In the verses, Bradley Cooper and Gaga’s lyrics and vocal lines are mirrored — two world-weary cynics serenading each other. But with the chorus, the song turns from country to power ballad as Gaga leaps into her higher register: “I’m off the deep end, watch as I dive in / I’ll never meet the ground!” Initially, she’s softer, hesitant until they harmonize — their fates entwined. But then, Gaga summons her inner strength to unleash that iconic “almighty wail,” surrendering to her emotions once and for all. It’s no wonder “Shallow” struck a chord. Even from just the trailer. The song bottles the heart-pounding feeling of Ally stepping onto Jackson Maine’s stage for the first time, her life about to change forever. At the 2019 Oscars, Cooper and Gaga finally performed the song as themselves, bringing the melodrama of the silver screen into real life and securing a win for “Shallow” that night. Whether it’s Judy Garland and James Mason, Barbra Streisand and Kris Kristofferson, or Cooper and Gaga, A Star Is Born’s myths of ambition and tragedy still resonate in a popular culture enamored with fame. But in the years since, “Shallow” hasn’t just transcended the film; it has become one of the few songs of any genre to attain the status of modern-day standard. On Spotify, it’s by far Gaga’s most streamed song — with more than 1.8 billion plays.

Unlike any other track on Gaga’s debut, “Paparazzi” depicts fame not as a hedonistic playground, but an erotic thriller turned horror film. Gaga’s lyrics weave together love, voyeurism, and stalkerish obsession, as she forces her subject into the role she wants them to play. Rob Fusari’s production channels the bouncy, percussive rhythms of Timbaland, but strips away his excesses, while dissonant verses give way to a major-key chorus that’s so pretty it’s unsettling, unreal: “Baby you’ll be famous / Chase you down until you love me.” On the radio in 2009, it sounded alluring and dangerous — there was nothing else like it.

In the seven-minute music video, released in June 2009, Gaga plays a fallen star who murders her boyfriend to reach an even higher level of infamy. Directed by Jonas Åkerlund, it felt like the first pop video in years that aspired to art-cinema status — with shots invoking Vertigo, Metropolis, and the films of Federico Fellini. And with its array of high-fashion looks, including bedazzled wheelchairs and crutches, glam mugshots, and a Minnie Mouse murderess outfit, “Paparazzi” marked the point where everything about Gaga’s performance-art ambitions clicked.

She soon outdid herself with a fever-pitch, star-making performance at the 2009 VMAs — the same night where Madonna memorialized Michael Jackson, and Kanye interrupted Taylor. The year after Britney Spears’s public breakdown was a strange time to want to become a pop star. But as Gaga hung from the ceiling, dripping with stage blood, she refused to be an object of fame. She’d do it on her own terms, or not at all.

Lady Gaga first introduced “Born This Way” after accepting the 2010 VMA for Video of the Year while wearing (of all things) her infamous meat dress. In one of the most emotional moments in MTV’s history, she belted the song’s chorus a cappella — moved to tears not by her own personal success but by her message. Gaga didn’t just want to write the greatest, most uplifting LGBTQ+ anthem of all time; she wanted to change the world. The power of “Born This Way” lies in its directness. It pulls no punches. It demands self-respect. Even if you don’t believe in yourself, Gaga believes in you. Her vocals, inspired by Whitney Houston, channel the higher power of gospel music. Yet she sings over a synth-heavy track that growls and crackles with electricity so loudly that you can barely make out the individual elements. “Born This Way” feels like a single collective organism: spiritual, mechanical, alive.

It led to her freakiest music video to date, which imagined the birth of an alien race — one that “bears no prejudice, no judgment, but boundless freedom.” With amniotic fluids, prosthetic horns, and surreal dance sequences, Gaga pushed the viewer to accept beauty in all forms — especially in transhumanist imagery.

Perhaps no pop song of the 2010s provoked so much debate — even from sympathetic listeners. There are some questionable word choices (“orient,” “chola”), and beyond the Madonna comparisons, Valentino’s disco classic “I Was Born This Way” predated Gaga by 36 years. But more than a decade later, it’s inarguable that “Born This Way” kicked down doors. Or at least opened the minds of many of the queer youths who needed to hear its message. In a beautiful act of serendipity, “Born This Way” was the Billboard Hot 100 chart’s 1,000th No. 1 single. In the first half of the 2010s, there were many pop songs written with a purpose in mind. “Born This Way” is the one we’ll remember. Time has proven its truth.

“The Edge of Glory” is a huge, major-key, Springsteen-infused dance anthem — and the rare pop song that dares to stare death in the face. Opening with the sound of a heartbeat, synthesizers pulse and swirl around Gaga, building to an electrified chorus. As her voice climbs higher and higher — “I’m on the edge, the edge, the edge, the edge!” — Gaga makes you a believer. The song was inspired by her grandfather’s passing; death comes for us all, but Gaga transcends it by living without fear: “It isn’t hell if everybody knows my name tonight!” Just three years after her debut, she was already thinking about the legacy she’d leave behind. “The Edge of Glory” may channel ’80s pop, but it already feels timeless — it’s one of the most joyful, existential pop songs ever written.

Compared to her past music videos, “The Edge of Glory” is eerily empty — but no less magical. Clad in Siouxsie-like makeup, Gaga lip-syncs and struts, unchoreographed, across an artificial New York City apartment block, staring directly into the camera with the hunger of a woman on top of the world. There’s nothing to draw your eye away from her. The only other person in the video is Clarence Clemons, the E Street Band’s legendary saxophonist, doing what he does best — vocalizing the sound of pure passion — in one final, career-encompassing solo before his death just days later. You couldn’t imagine a more poetic way to ride off into the sunset.

Could there be any other choice? Released in October 2009, “Bad Romance” not only defined the end of the 2000s. Its shadow still hangs over pop music today. Despite its title, the song isn’t just about love — or even a toxic relationship. It’s about confronting the darkness that lies both within and outside of everyone. The track is built from the same basic skeleton as “Poker Face,” but every element is at war with itself; hooks, verses, and pre-choruses collide and repeat in different formations. RedOne’s signature sound becomes nightmarish: His four-on-the-floor drums are explosive. His synths ice-cold. The dissonant hoover synths seethe like Bernard Herrmann strings — echoing the lyrics’ references to Hitchcock’s Psycho, Vertigo, and Rear Window. Gaga stamps her name on the “Gaga, ooh-la-la” hook — which is both nonsensical and totally coherent. A vocalization of pure mania. Over one of the most powerful bridges in pop history, tension builds as Gaga’s vocals cascade around you. “I don’t wanna be friends,” she begs over and over until her voice leaps up an octave, quavering with vibrato, and the music drops out — “Want your bad romance!” It’s all or nothing.

Then there’s the video (directed by Francis Lawrence, who’d later helm The Hunger Games sequels), which takes place in a white room reminiscent of 2001: A Space Odyssey’s bedroom — the stage where all life plays out. The clip begins with an electrified snippet of a Bach fugue until Gaga and her dancers awaken. She’s kidnapped, drugged, and forced to perform for Russian gangsters — a metaphor for how the music industry commodifies artists. Gaga’s movements and outfits are as much body horror as high fashion — obscuring her face as she dances, clawing at the air. In what could be the definitive image of Gaga’s career, we see brief glimpses of her face in extreme close-up looking impossibly glamorous but with fewer adornments than we’d ever seen on her at the time. Like a religious icon or a silent-film star, she weeps openly — acknowledging the song’s emotional turmoil. The message: Without true vulnerability, there can be no art, no love, no expression — only fear and the inevitability of death. So in the end, she burns her male captor alive. She’ll never be beholden to anyone again.

“Bad Romance,” in song and in video, is boundless. It draws no distinctions between classical music, high fashion, avant-garde cinema, dance, or pop. In five months, it became YouTube’s most viewed video at the time; its sheer strangeness only made it more compelling to a mass audience. Lady Gaga began as a fame-hungry, Warholian persona, but “Bad Romance” completed her transformation into a truly fearless, all-encompassing artist. It was the biggest risk (and reward) of her career to date. The Fame Monster is still Gaga’s ultimate statement: There’s nothing to be afraid of — except everything.

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Kristen S. Hé

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June 27, 2024
A Son for a Son: The ‘House of the Dragon’ Season 2 Power Rankings
House of the Dragon is back, and the Dance of the Dragons is underway. The Targaryen war of succession will come down to control—who can control their impulses, their sycophants, and, yes, their dragons. With each passing episode, The Ringer will examine how Westeros’s key players are aligning their pieces on the board. As the saying goes, chaos can be a ladder. Welcome to the House of the Dragon power rankings.

1. Cregan Stark

In the opening scene of Season 2 of House of the Dragon, Cregan Stark—a.k.a. the Wolf of the North, a.k.a. the ancestor of the Starkfam we know and love from Game of Thrones—immediately comes across as the most righteous dude in all the Seven Kingdoms. Hosting disputed prince Jacaerys Velaryon at the Wall, Cregan shows him around with all the pride and extreme patience of a college senior giving a pre-frosh and their parents a campus tour: Here’s the bazillion-foot-tall elevator built by my ancestors, and over that way is basically death’s door; yes, we believe in single-sex education at this institution, our motto is “Duty Is Sacrifice,” and did you know that our admissions rate is a steady 10 percent?

After all that, Cregan also makes sure to educate the naive, young Jace about the ways of the world. “Do you think my ancestors built a 700-foot wall of ice to keep out snow and savages?” he asks, explaining that the Wall also fortifies Westeros against that oldest and wiliest of foes, Death. (These taciturnt Starks sure love to bring everything back to first principles.) He remarks that, as legend has it, Jace’s Targaryen forebears once showed up flaunting their dragons—and that the mighty beasts, for all their fire-breathing power, instinctively knew not to cross the Wall. And, crucially, Cregan agrees to uphold his family’s old oath to Rhaenyra—but stresses that it’s super not his top priority right now and that the best he can do is send the “thousands of graybeards who’ve already seen too many winters,” take them or leave them.

As the Targaryens continue to bicker about who gets to sit the Iron Throne, Cregan, quite simply, just rules. Sadly, though, like all the best sigma males, the Wolf of the North will be leaving everyone wanting more. According to showrunner Ryan Condal, we’re not likely to see Cregan Stark again until some future season. Terrible news for viewers, but if the good, cold lord has taught us anything, it’s that “this is not a sentence—but an honor.” I bend the knee.

2. Larys Strong

The total opposite of Cregan Stark in so many ways! Far from being motivated by pure familial loyalty, Larys is a dirty double kinslayer. Rather than viewing King’s Landing squabbles as distractions from a broader existential crisis, Larys’s entire existence is defined by the subtle art of the throne room scheme. Whereas Cregan speaks plainly, Larys prefers to insinuate and suggest … like when he murmurs to the Dowager Queen Alicent that he knows she was “indisposed” recently. (By “indisposed,” he means that she was Ser on Criston till she Cole.) And instead of defending against Death, he orders it up: In the Season 2 premiere, we learn that Larys, seeking to root out disloyal servants, has taken the liberty of ousting members of Alicent’s previous castle staff. (By “ousting,” I mean, in his words, that “they no longer breathe our air.”)

Still, while he may be a weird dude through and through, Larys’s lurker shtick does seem to be working. He has long had a certain podiatryst arrangement with Alicent (sorry), but now that he’s personally handpicked all her maidservants, he doesn’t even need to be in the room to make her feel vulnerable and violated and claustrophobic and in need of a good scrub-a-dub-dub. That’s quite some power to wield over the mother of the king! And speaking of the king, Larys is getting in Aegon’s head, too: “Otto Hightower was your father’s hand, your grace,” he tells the young monarch, ostensibly laying the foundation for a Small Council shake-up.

It can be hard out there for Larys types: In Game of Thrones, both Littlefinger and Varys, two elite-level manipulators, eventually made one too many chess moves and met their respective dooms. But for now, Larys appears poised to take a big leap: from Alicent’s wanker footman to, potentially, the hand of the king.

3. The Crime Cloak

Need to stay anonymous in some seedy crowd but don’t feel like hiding even an inch of your face? In the mood to conspire on, commit, or conceal any number of crimes? Look no further than the humble cloak, the hottest garment in Westeros.

Are you someone nicknamed “the White Worm”? Perhaps you’d like this version, which resembles crushed silk. Need to easily reach your various swords and jacket buckles? This one gives Aemond great placket access when he’s on a mission! Rhaenys rocked the cloak when she escaped the castle ahead of Aegon’s coronation, and so did Otto Hightower when he made a business proposition to the White Worm herself. But the GOAT cloaker remains Daemon Targaryen, who really is a man for all seasons. His collection includes a bulky overcloak (worn for the occasion of killing his pesky first wife) and a cloak with lovely trim (his boatwear). He has even sported (while in the midst of grooming his teen niece and future bride) a sort of Flea Bottom version of the Investment Banker Patagonia: a cloak that kind of looks like a vest, worn over a white collared shirt.

With a lewk that is part collegiate swim team parka and part Dark Kermit, and with a hood that somehow never gets blown off by a breeze and ruins the whole disguise, the Crime Cloak comes with all sorts of options to fit one’s sinister style—all while you’re blending in, lying low, and/or planning the murder of an heir to the Iron Throne.

4. The Power Couple (Corlys and Rhaenys Velaryon)

The Sea Snake and his dragonriding bride may not be the most powerful people in the realm, but as Season 2 begins, they are each in possession of a tremendous amount of leverage. Consider:
- Corlys is effectively and operationally in charge of what is currently Team Black’s most successful tactic: a blockade of shipping lanes in the Stepstones that “has placed King’s Landing under strain,” according to Otto Hightower. While that hasn’t necessarily been easy to maintain—Corlys mentions a pressing need for more ships—it’s nevertheless a solid head start until Team Green can find a way to bolster its Lannister and Hightower navies.
- Rhaenys and her dragon, Meleys, are essential to this effort: “I alone patrol over a hundred miles of open sea, endlessly, to hold the blockade,” she tells Daemon.
- Rhaenys and Meleys are also essential to another effort, Daemon says: “With my dragon and yours together, we can kill Vhagar and her rider.” (That rider being Aemond Targaryen.) When Rhaenys demurs, Daemon tries to insist: “Fly with me. It is a command.” But the Queen Who Never Was always knows what’s what. “Would that you were the king,” she deadpans back. Daemon is many things, but he isn’t the boss of her.
- Both Corlys and Rhaenys are cooperating with Rhaenyra and Daemon despite having many, many excellent reasons not to. Like the fact that their only two children both married Targaryens and both (to their knowledge, at least) wound up dead, conveniently enabling Rhaenyra and Daemon to wed each other. (That said, I do sometimes wonder whether Rhaenys secretly knows that Leanor lives!) Or the fact that Daemon killed Corlys’s brother, Vaemond, for speaking the truth.
For now, it behooves the Velaryons to align with Team Black. But if that personal calculus changes even a little, suddenly everything from sky to sea becomes a whole different equation altogether.

5. The Royal Couple (King Aegon II and Queen Helaena)

This brother-sister, husband-wife, dalliant-dreamer, king-queen duo has always been a bizarre couple, and not just because of the whole inbreeding thing. “The queen is an enduring mystery, is she not?” says Aegon early in the Season 2 premiere, having just heard Helaena anxiously whisper something about being scared of rats. Indeed, going into this episode and this season, one thing that most excited me was finding out more about this wedded set of sibs. Like, do they have any common interests? What do they possibly talk about?!

In the wake of “A Son for a Son,” I now have my answer: It’s safe to say that they’re about to share the common interest of “avenging the gruesome murder of our sweet, dead, 6-year-old, heir-to-the-throne child.” (Aegon doesn’t know about it yet as the episode ends, but he obviously will soon.) This is a potent motivation—particularly when it comes to Aegon and Helaena, both of whom are powerful people.

One of them, of course, is king, and not just any king: He’s (a) a young king who is (b) eager to prove himself and (c) soon to be grieving his fine boy and, oh yeah, (d) was already close to shaking up the ranks of his nearest advisers. In other words, there’s really no telling what he might do next, only that it will be something drastic. And then there’s Helaena, who has consistently, if cryptically, predicted the future. If she can start harnessing her soothsaying into more actionable thoughts and ideas, she could have a weapon as vital as any flying dragon.

6. Aemond Targaryen

Speaking of flying dragons: Aemond’s mount, Vhagar, remains Team Green’s best weapon by far at the moment. Yet: “You do not have a seat at this council,” snaps Otto Hightower to Aemond when the latter enters the Small Council room in the midst of a meeting. But Otto’s boss begs to differ: “Aemond is my closest blood and our best sword,” says King Aegon II. “I welcome him.” Aemond may be in his mother’s doghouse for that minor mistake of accidentally killing his nephew, but in the Season 2 premiere, he demonstrated that he’s more than ready for the warfare to escalate further.

“My brother is hostage to my grandsire and mother,” Aemond complains to Criston Cole as they plot paths to victory, “and they tell him that a war of dragons can yet be avoided.” Not anymore, needless to say—which means that Aemond is almost certainly about to take flight.

7. Daemon Targaryen

As Aemond positions himself to become the new Daemon, this week’s episode sort of made Daemon out to be the new Aemond: Daemon took his zest for vengeance a little too far, then everything got out of hand, now a boy is dead and war is coming, and probably thar be dragons. He has simultaneously made the world chillingly simple—tit for tat, a son for a son, repeat as often as necessary—while also complicating everything. And the scariest part, as ever, is that he’s probably pretty OK with all that he’s done.

8. Rhaenyra Targaryen

The queen in exile had only one line this episode, but it was a doozy: “I want Aemond Targaryen.” Those four words were all it took to set off the Rube Goldberg contraption of events that culminated in another dead kid. The good news: That’s some power right there! The bad news: Aemond Targaryen still lives.

9. Jacaerys Velaryon

Jace’s diplomatic visit to the Wall was a definite success. And the guy also appears to have some semblance of a moral compass, the likes of which we don’t typically see in the halls of power south of Winterfell. But that makes me nervous for him! If we’ve learned anything from Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon thus far, it’s that Westeros has a way of punishing intrinsic goodness and curdling warm hearts.

10. Mysaria the White Worm

one of the best scenes of episode 01, it summarizes perfectly what matt, emma and ryan talked about how daemon deal with grief, he’s angry but the more she explains the more he backtrack, the more he gets soft and hurt again, it’s not her fault. pic.twitter.com/nV2fqsmUiR

— thai. (@nyracult) June 17, 2024

Tired: Constantly dealing with Daemon’s bullshit.

Wired: Saying what the hell, selling secrets to Otto, and then spitting at Daemon: “You only blame me because your true enemies are out of reach.”

Inspired: Sure, Daemon may have imprisoned Mysaria, but this is the White Worm we’re talking about; this woman downright thrives in shitty situations. I completely expect her to emerge from captivity with a whole new cadre of associates and operatives.

11. Alyn of Hull

“They tell me that you are the one that dragged my body out of the sea,” Corlys Velaryon says to Alyn of Hull—a newly introduced, seemingly humble boatsman down at the Driftmark docks—in the season premiere. “I am indebted to you, Alyn,” the Sea Snake adds. Not a bad House of the Dragon character debut! Something tells me this won’t be the last we see of Alyn, who also mentions having a brother … a note that seems to pique Corlys’s interest. This situation is developing …

12. Otto Hightower

You know what, in a sick way, I almost felt bad for Otto this episode! He may be a self-involved prick, but the guy couldn’t catch a break. What’s worse: clocking your daughter and her favorite knight basking in clear post-hookup bliss, or discovering your grandson and that same knight discussing battle plans without you? Getting undermined by an amateur king who knows nothing about anything, or being plotted against by a slimy would-be usurper who knows way too much? Otto is a survivor indeed, but even cockroaches know that sometimes the only way to endure is to scatter and hide.

13. The Smallfolk

When it comes to lobbying powerful people to make decisions that benefit special interest groups, King’s Landing is a lot like New York City. You have Hugh the scorpion builder guy asking for, and being granted, better benefits for him and his fellow anti-dragon arms manufacturers, like he’s the NYPD getting funding for a bunch of new drones or surveillance vans or something. And then you have poor Jerard the Shepherd, whose simple ask—that the crown return his tithe of livestock so that he can make it through the winter!—is initially granted by Aegon the Magnanimous … only for the young ruler to get an earful from Otto and totally renege on the deal, Kathy Hochul style. Canceling congestion pricing, it turns out, is the feeding sheep to dragons of our time. Sounds about right.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXawRGz2S_c

14. That One Couple (Dowager Queen Alicent and Ser Criston Cole)

We’ve all known that one horned-up secret couple that thinks they’re being all sly and surreptitious with their dalliances but are actually hooking up all over creation and fooling absolutely no one. Typically, this happens during, like, adolescence. But in the case of House of the Dragon—where very few people have developmentally normal upbringings—it’s the Dowager Queen GILF and her Kingsguardsman who have apparently taken to christening every damn room in the palace.

For Alicent, who spent years married to a decaying, old King Viserys and now serves at the pleasure of her firstborn failson, King Aegon II, all this carrying on seems to be a way to reclaim both her lost youth and her feeling of power. For Ser Criston, it’s maybe a bit more complex. Once upon a time, he raged at a young Rhaenyra for even suggesting a sworn-guard-with-benefits situation, but now that’s what he basically has with Alicent. It’s a direct and dishonorable flouting of his Kingsguard oaths, yet it also helps keep Criston in the room where it happens.

This is all fun and games until someone loses a head. (An eye is so Season 1.) Alicent has for years sought to avoid a truly violent conflict, but it now seems like her window of time to achieve peace has slammed shut. And even outside the Small Council, her image as a doting mother is in shambles. It’s bad enough that Alicent and Criston were indisposed while two assassins breached a royal bedroom and killed a child in front of his mother. But then Helaena walks in on her mom mid-bone? That’s the stuff of nightmares, whether you’re a dreamer or not. I expect to see Helaena posting on the r/raisedbynarcissists subreddit before long.

15. Blood and Cheese

While Alicent is banging away, the rats will play! And for a moment, this bumbling pair of Hightower-hating, Harry-’n’-Lloyd-coded creeps seems like they might be the most powerful henchmen in the land. First, they pocket the initial half of that sweet, sweet bounty money. Then they sidle straight through the throne room in plain sight, working the “walk with purpose and act like you’re meant to be there” Super Bowl scammer strategy to perfection. And before long, they find themselves with the future of the realm literally right there in their grasp.

But then they go ahead and destroy all these Ws by completing the job that Daemon contracted them to do. Well, sort of: Unable to locate their primary target, the eminently recognizable and full-grown Aemond, they settle for the next (and worst) option: cherubic 6-year-old Jaehaerys, son of Aegon and his sister-wife, Helaena. “A son for a son,” Blood and Cheese explain to a shell-shocked Helaena, making it pretty obvious who probably sent them—and ultimately removing any remaining leverage or value they may have had.

16. The Next Generation

If you’re a youngish Targaryen or Velaryon or Hightower who thinks you have your whole life ahead of you: You probably don’t!!! While “generation” has a way of losing all meaning in the context of the incestuous Targaryen family tree, it doesn’t really matter in this case who is an uncle-husband or who is a daughter-niece: Anyone young enough to have any future at all is highly vulnerable at present, and the horrors only seem to be escalating.

One day you’re monkeying around in a dragon’s cave with your cousins and/or uncles; the next, you’re getting chomped by Vhagar. One minute you’re playing with attendance balls and being promised human horseback rides; the next, you’re missing a head. RIP, little Jaeharys! I’m bummed we won’t get to see what would have happened when you inevitably reproduced with your nearly identical twin sister a decade hence.

17. Tyland Lannister

Stay gold, Ponyboy. Stay gold.

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The Ringer Newsletter
Katie Baker

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June 18, 2024
‘Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes’ and the ‘Apes’ Movie Rankings

Sean and Amanda are joined by Van Lathan to discuss the new installment in the Planet of the Apes franchise, the enduring power of the Apes IP, and how it relates to modern IP storytelling (1:00). Finally, they rank the 10 films in the franchise (1:05:00).

Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins
Guest: Van Lathan
Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner

Subscribe: Spotify / Apple Podcasts / Stitcher / RSS

Sean Fennessey

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May 14, 2024
World Snooker Championship: Mark Williams knocked out by Si Jiahui in last-frame thriller as seeds keep tumbling

Three-time world champion Mark Williams beaten 10-9 by 2023 semi-finalist Si Jiahui at the Crucible; Welshman’s exit means six seeds have now fallen in the first round so far; Ronnie O’Sullivan begins bid for eighth title against Jackson Page on Wednesday afternoon

Last Updated: 23/04/24 6:23pm

Mark Williams lost 10-9 to Si Jiahui in the first round of the World Snooker Championship

Mark Williams’ quest for a fourth World Snooker Championship title ended in the first round as he lost a last-frame thriller to 2023 semi-finalist Si Jiahui.

Sixth seed Williams – world champion in 2000, 2003 and 2018 – led 5-4 after Monday’s opening session but then found himself 8-5 down as Si reeled off four frames in a row on Tuesday afternoon.

The 49-year-old then recovered from 9-7 down to force a decider but his Chinese opponent, 21, knocked in a nerveless break of 77 in the 19th frame to secure a second-round meeting with fellow qualifier Jak Jones.

Si lost to Luca Brecel in the 2023 semi-finals in Sheffield

Williams’ exit takes the number of seeds eliminated in the first round to six, with defending champion Luca Brecel, four-time winner Mark Selby, Ali Carter, Gary Wilson and Zhang Anda also dispatched.

O’Sullivan plays first match on Wednesday afternoon

Williams was hoping to become the oldest champion in the tournament’s history, a record held by Ronnie O’Sullivan, who was 46 years and 148 days when he won the most recent of his seven Crucible trophies in 2022.

O’Sullivan begins his bid for an outright record eighth world title against Jackson Page at 2.30pm on Wednesday, with that match then concluding from 1pm the following day.

Jak Jones is Si’s second-round opponent this year after he beat 11th seed Zhang Anda at the weekend

Si led Luca Brecel 14-5 in last year’s semi-final, only to lose the match 17-15 as Brecel won 12 of the next 13 frames in a Crucible-record comeback.

Si’s clash with Williams was viewed as one of the ties of the first round, with Williams winning the previous tournament on the calendar, the Tour Championship in Manchester.

Williams, 49, defeated Judd Trump, Mark Allen and O’Sullivan – the top three players in the world rankings – in successive matches to claim his second ranking title of the season, after the British Open in Cheltenham in October.

Dominic Dale is playing at The Crucible for the first time in 10 years

What else happened on Tuesday?

Elsewhere, 2020 finalist Kyren Wilson surged into an 8-1 lead over Dominic Dale.

Dale, who is the oldest player at this year’s competition at the age of 52 and playing at the Crucible for the first time in 10 years, had one moment to cheer against Wilson – a sublime 120 clearance.

World No 17 Jack Liswoski leads seventh seed and 2016 finalist Ding Junhui 5-4, while Mark Allen romped into a 7-2 advantage over Robbie Williams.

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April 23, 2024
Ever Wonder Why Certain Websites Rank Higher Than Yours? This SEO Expert Reveals Why. | Entrepreneur

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Have you ever wondered why some businesses consistently top search engine results? It’s often the smart use of SEO, now supercharged with AI, particularly in keyword optimization.

As a technical SEO expert with over two decades of experience in website development and digital marketing, I’ve seen firsthand how AI is revolutionizing the SEO landscape, making it more efficient and targeted.

AI in SEO is like a super-sleuth assistant, effortlessly analyzing mountains of data to uncover trends and insights, leading to smarter, more impactful SEO strategies.

Transforming keyword research

Gone are the days of manually sifting through keywords. AI transforms this process, delving deep into data to reveal not just popular keywords but also niche phrases and emerging trends. It goes beyond just picking keywords — it’s like getting into your audience’s heads and really understanding their needs and wants.

Making AI work for you in keyword optimization

Ever wonder how AI can work wonders for your SEO? It all starts with choosing the right AI tool—think of it as finding a savvy partner in your SEO journey.

Choosing the right tool

You need an AI-driven keyword tool that matches your business’s unique needs and brings a set of skills that can truly make a difference. Think of it as finding a tool that speaks your language and understands your goals.

Look for a comprehensive data analysis tool. It should dive deep into the sea of data and surface with valuable insights. Consider SEO tools like Ahrefs or SEMrush, which are like the seasoned guides of the SEO world.

They can predict trends and provide insights into what your audience is actually searching for. It’s not just about having a lot of data; it’s about having the right data that can tell you about user intent and future search trends.

This way, you’re not just shooting arrows in the dark but strategically aiming based on informed predictions.

Understand user intent

Diving into the world of user intent is a bit like being a mind reader. It’s all about understanding why someone typed a query into a search engine.

Is it to buy something? To learn? To find a specific website? Or to have a question answered? AI tools are here to help you crack this code. For example, when you use a tool like MarketMuse or Clearscope, it’s like having a conversation with your audience without them saying a word. These tools analyze search queries and give you insights into what your audience really wants from their search.

Now, imagine you run an online gardening store. AI might reveal that a significant portion of your audience searches for “how to care for indoor plants.” This is a clear signal to focus on informational content, perhaps a blog post or a how-to guide, rather than just pushing product pages. Conversely, if you notice a high volume of searches like “buy indoor plant fertilizer,” that’s a transactional intent where your product pages should take center stage. But here’s a twist: not all traffic is beneficial.

Suppose your AI tool shows a surge in queries like “free indoor plants.” This traffic might not be valuable if your goal is to boost sales, as these users are likely looking for giveaways or contests, not to make a purchase. In this scenario, understanding user intent helps you refine your SEO strategy to attract the right kind of traffic — the kind that aligns with your business goals and converts.

Stay agile

Embracing AI in your SEO strategy is a bit like surfing. You need to stay agile and ready to ride the waves of change as they come. AI tools are fantastic at providing real-time data, offering a snapshot of what’s happening right now. It’s like having a weather forecast for your SEO strategy. Just as a surfer would check the weather and wave conditions, using AI tools allows you to monitor current trends, search patterns and changes in user behavior.

Let’s say you run a fitness website and notice a sudden spike in searches for “home workout routines” due to an unexpected event, like a lockdown. This real-time data is your cue to quickly pivot and focus on creating content that matches this emerging interest. Perhaps you could introduce a new blog series or video content around home workouts. But here’s where agility really counts: not every trend or surge in searches is worth pursuing.

It’s about discerning which waves are worth riding. If a trending topic doesn’t align with your brand or offers little potential for conversion, it may not be beneficial to chase it. The agility afforded by AI isn’t just about quick reactions; it’s also about making smart, strategic decisions based on real-time insights.

Merge AI insights with your content strategy

Incorporating AI insights into your content strategy is like having a seasoned chef in your kitchen — one who knows exactly what your guests crave. It’s about blending the science of data with the art of content creation.

AI tools do more than gather data; they offer insights that can shape your content strategy, ensuring it’s not only rich with the right keywords but also resonates deeply with your audience. For instance, imagine you’re running a travel blog. AI might reveal that your audience is increasingly searching for “sustainable travel tips.” This insight is a goldmine.

It guides you to create content focused on eco-friendly travel, perhaps a series of articles or an in-depth guide on the topic. This targeted approach ensures your content is not just relevant but also highly engaging and likely to attract the right kind of traffic — people genuinely interested in sustainable travel.

However, it’s important to remember that AI is a tool, not a magic wand. It provides the map, but you need to embark on the journey. While AI can suggest topics and keywords based on trends and user intent, the creativity in how you present this content — the unique voice, the compelling storytelling is up to you. This is where your understanding of your audience’s preferences, combined with your brand’s unique perspective, comes into play.

Related: How Does AI Writing Impact Your SEO? Here’s What You Need to Know.

Merging AI insights with your content strategy enables you to create content that’s not only optimized for search engines but also genuinely valuable and engaging for your audience. It’s about striking that perfect balance between data-driven precision and creative flair.

Conclusion

Integrating AI into your SEO strategy, particularly for keyword optimization, isn’t just a nice to have; it’s becoming essential in a digital world where staying ahead of the curve means understanding and leveraging the latest technologies. By embracing AI, you’re not just optimizing your SEO efforts — you’re setting your business up for smarter, more successful online engagement.

Ludwig Makhyan

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March 14, 2024
Ali Carter criticises ‘morons’ in crowd during Masters defeat to Ronnie O’Sullivan at Alexandra Palace

Ronnie O’Sullivan recovered from 6-3 down to beat Ali Carter 10-7 in the final at
Alexandra Palace and claim a record-extending eighth Masters crown; Carter was unhappy at some members of the crowd during his defeat

Last Updated: 15/01/24 11:48am

Ali Carter had to settle for a runner-up finish at Alexandra Palace

Ali Carter has criticised “some morons” in the Alexandra Palace crowd after squandering a three-frame lead to lose to Ronnie O’Sullivan in the Masters final.

Carter looked set for a first Triple Crown title as he opened up a 5-3 lead after the first session and immediately extended his advantage when play resumed, only to lose seven out of the last eight frames to hand O’Sullivan a 10-7 victory.

O’Sullivan was the fans’ favourite on Sunday and a boisterous atmosphere led to the referee having to remind spectators about noise on multiple occasions when shots were being played, with Carter registering just 41 points from his final four frames.

Carter held a 6-3 lead before losing seven of the next eight frames

“It’s hard enough to beat [O’Sullivan]” Carter said. “But when you’ve got people shouting when you are on your shot and saying stupid things at important times because half of them haven’t got enough brains, it’s ridiculous.

“There are some morons in the crowd. It is just unbelievable really.”

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Victory for O’Sullivan means he has now won 23 Triple Crown titles, five more than Stephen Hendry, and can complete a clean sweep of the game’s biggest events with an eighth World Championship title at the Crucible later this year.

“Obviously I’m gutted I lost,” Carter added. “It’s all about winning at the end of the day, but before I rocked up here last week I’d have taken the final so there’s a lot of good things to come for me.

“I’m heading in the right direction. Ronnie played very well there in the end. I tried my best and it just wasn’t good enough today.”

O’Sullivan shocked by Masters win

O’Sullivan reeled off three frames in a row to get back on level terms before recovering from falling 7-6 behind to win the next four and snatch victory, 29 years on from his first victory at the event.

“I don’t know how I’ve won this tournament, to be honest with you,” O’Sullivan told BBC Sport. “I’ve just dug deep. I’ve tried to play with a bit of freedom and then tonight I just thought try to keep Ali honest and if he’s going to win it he’s going to have to scrape me off the table.

Ronnie O’Sullivan also won the UK Championship last month

“I just wanted to see if he had it at the end. Ali didn’t play great tonight, he played better this afternoon, but tonight he let me off the hook a few times.

“He was aggressive today but tonight he didn’t take on some of the balls I thought he might have and gave me a little bit of breathing space.”

O’Sullivan can become just the fourth player to win all three events in the Triple Crown in the same season

O’Sullivan’s victory sees him become the oldest winner in the tournament’s history, although the 48-year-old – who can complete a clean sweep of the game’s biggest events with an eighth World Championship title at the Crucible – insists he was better in his teens.

“I thought when I was 12, 13, 14, 15, 16 I was even better then than I was now to be honest with you,” O’Sullivan told Eurosport. “Technically I felt I was much better, more consistency. These days I’m a bit in and out and I search for it.

“It’s got better since 2001 and I’ve had to work on the technical side just to keep things as tight as I can.

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January 15, 2024
The Young Movie Star Power Rankings

Matt is joined by Deadline senior reporter Justin Kroll to discuss the young movie stars on the rise and fall after a chaotic movie year in Hollywood. They highlight the movies that catapulted young actors into stardom, as well as some of the more puzzling casting decisions that potentially hurt someone’s career. Matt finishes the show with a prediction about the 2024 box office in January and February.

For a 20 percent discount on Matt’s Hollywood insider newsletter, What I’m Hearing …, click here.

Email us your thoughts! thetown@spotify.com

Host: Matt Belloni
Guest: Justin Kroll
Producers: Craig Horlbeck and Jessie Lopez
Theme Song: Devon Renaldo

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Matthew Belloni

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January 3, 2024
Broadcom now ranks among 10 largest U.S. companies after big 2023 stock gains

Nvidia Corp. has catapulted up the list of the most valuable U.S. companies this year, rising eight spots from the end of last year to sit in the fifth position with a market capitalization of $1.2 trillion.

But other chip companies have seen their positions rise even more. Just look at Broadcom Inc.
AVGO,
+2.10%,
which has climbed 16 spots over the course of 2023 and on Friday cracked the top 10 for the first time, according to Dow Jones Market Data. Broadcom eclipsed Visa Inc.
V,
-0.27%
at Friday’s close to take the No. 10 spot, with a valuation of $527.7 billion.

Read: Could Nvidia’s stock — up 231% this year — actually be a bargain?

Admittedly, Broadcom had some help along the way. The company acquired VMware in late November, and its market capitalization gained about $50 billion at the close of the transaction, according to FactSet data.

But Broadcom’s ascent also reflects how chip stocks have gotten more shine this year amid the artificial-intelligence frenzy. Broadcom’s stock has doubled so far in 2023.

Mizuho desk-based analyst Jordan Klein expects “an order acceleration in networking silicon for AI clusters” in the second half of 2024, as calendar year 2025 could bring a big year of capital-expenditure investments in AI for ethernet back-end high-speed connections.

Broadcom “is the KEY WINNER in that investment cycle as the arms dealer to all networking OEMs,” or original equipment manufacturers, wrote Klein, who’s associated with Mizuho’s sales team and not its research arm.

Advanced Micro Devices Inc.
AMD,
+0.83%
has also seen a nice march up the charts, rising 48 spots so far in 2023 to rank 30th in terms of market cap. AMD was valued at $223.9 billion as of Friday’s close.

“We view AMD as well-positioned to gain incremental share of the hugely profitable $100 billion-plus accelerator market while continuing to make progress in server [central processing units] against incumbent [Intel],” BofA Securities analyst Vivek Arya wrote in a recent upgrade.

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December 15, 2023
The best city for celebrating Thanksgiving? It’s San Francisco.

The City by the Bay is the best place to enjoy a Thanksgiving bash, at least according to a new report.

The personal-finance website WalletHub ranked San Francisco as the top U.S. spot to celebrate Turkey Day. New York, home to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, didn’t even crack the top 10 of the cities the site surveyed, landing instead in position No. 37.

Among…

Master your money.

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November 23, 2023
The Death of Bellator, Tom Aspinall’s P4P Rankings Debut, and Why Jon Jones Vs. Francis Ngannou Might Still Happen!
Still buzzing from last weekend’s UFC 295, Ariel, Chuck, and Petesy have a lot to get into on today’s show. First, the guys discuss this weekend’s final Bellator card and why the energy (or lack thereof) surrounding Bellator 301 is symbolic of the promotion’s entire existence. Then, the guys break down their latest pound-for-pound rankings before taking Discord questions about Alex Pereira’s legendary run, Ian Garry’s beef with Team Renegade, how the Saudis could convince Dana White to make the fight of the century, and more. Plus, a classic game of Buy or Sell.

To enter into our lovely Discord community, click this link.

TOPICS:
- Intro (00:00)
- The end of Bellator (03:07)
- Why Bellator doesn’t invoke the same nostalgia Strikeforce does (08:49)
- Saturday’s Paul Craig vs. Brendan Allen card at The Apex (21:02)
- Ariel’s conundrum with getting Tom Aspinall into his November pound-for-pound rankings (24:19)
- UFC fighters we feel most emotionally connected to (37:38)
- How the Saudis could get Dana White to make Jon Jones vs. Francis Ngannou (57:30)
- Buy or Sell (01:05:09)
Hosts: Ariel Helwani, Petesy Carroll, and Chuck Mindenhall
Producer: Troy Farkas

Subscribe: Spotify
Ariel Helwani

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November 16, 2023
The Best Super Mario Bros. Games: All 20 Ranked

The Super Mario Bros. series is packed full of outstanding games, which means it’s time to take a look back at them and see which ones were the cream of the crop. Here’s our ranking of all the best Super Mario Bros. games.

Note: Due to the expansive nature of the Super Mario Bros. series, spin-offs have been omitted from the rankings. This includes: Mario Party, Mario & Luigi, Mario Maker, and more.

20. Super Mario Land

Image Source: Nintendo

Nintendo pulled off the impossible when they released Super Mario Land for the Game Boy. Many thought Mario’s gameplay was meant solely for home console releases. Thanks to Gunpei Yokoi, creator of the Game Boy, and the rest of the team at Nintendo’s R&D1, Super Mario Land was a successful port of the traditional Mario gameplay.

While the game didn’t do much to innovate Mario gameplay, it did introduce a fun alternative to traditional underwater levels by giving Mario access to a submarine capable of shooting missiles, transforming Mario into a side-scrolling shooter.

19. Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins

Image Source: Nintendo

The second installment of the Land series saw the introduction of Mario’s infamous rival, Wario.

6 Golden Coins expanded on its predecessor with improved graphics, a save feature, and new power-ups. Unlike the original game, 6 Golden Coins added a significant amount of gameplay. Mario could now explore six new worlds in his quest to thwart Wario’s evil plan.

18. New Super Mario Bros. Wii

Image Source: Nintendo

The Wii release of New Super Mario Bros. transplanted the agility of Mario’s DS foray and mixed it beautifully with cooperative gameplay. The resulting game, when played with three other friends, transforms the usual precision of a typical side-scrolling Mario game into a chaotic game of precision and teamwork.

The biggest downside to the game is its difficulty – or lack of it. The game is pretty easy, even allowing players to “bubble” to safety at the tap of a button should they venture off a cliff or come dangerously close to an enemy Koopa.

17. Super Mario Bros: The Lost Levels

Image Source: Nintendo

The official sequel to the original Super Mario Bros game didn’t come to the US for quite some time, due to Nintendo believing the game to be too difficult for American audiences.

Fortunately, given the crazy success of Mario in general, they ultimately released this “Super Mario 2,” as The Lost Levels. Instead of walking you around the mechanics of the game, Lost Levels pushes you into the deep end right from world 1-1. This game is meant for people who’ve mastered the original game – the added challenge is nice, but can be discouraging for new players.

16. New Super Mario Bros. 2

Image Source: Nintendo

New Super Mario Bros. 2 holds on to its “new” moniker, and actually means it. The focus of NSMB2 is coins. Lots of coins. The game motivates players to actually collect coins, by making it feel good to actually grab them. The key? Shoving loads of coins in players faces, and giving players access to new power-ups, like the Golden Block, which continues to give Mario coins the faster he runs.

This simple gameplay tweak introduces an interesting new dynamic: throw caution to the wind and collect tons of coins. However, racing towards the end of the level now comes with a risk – death. This gambling-esque gameplay tweak is fun and refreshing. But for all the coins the game manages to shove in players faces, it doesn’t do much to reward greedy players.

15. New Super Mario Bros. (NDS)

Image Source: Nintendo

New Super Mario Bros. breathes a breath of fresh air into the traditional side-scrolling Mario experience. Mario retains his acrobatic abilities first introduced in Super Mario 64, and allows Mario to traverse a 2d landscape with style.

Fun new power-ups like the Propellor Mushroom and the Giant Mushroom force players to approach levels in new ways. And of all the “New” Super Mario games, this original DS title has the most cohesive level design, by forcing players to navigate thoughtfully made worlds.

14. New Super Mario Bros. U/New Super Luigi U

Image Source: Nintendo

New Super Mario Bros U iterates on the cooperative gameplay introduced in the Wii version of New Super Mario Bros, and expands on it by introducing a fifth player to the mix via use of the Wii U gamepad. This fifth player has the ability to draw platforms and stun enemies.

New Super Luigi U ups the difficulty ten-fold, bringing a challenging new take on an otherwise easy game.

13. Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island

Image Source: Nintendo

Despite the confusing name and shift to a more action-oriented gameplay style, Yoshi’s Island features some of the most interesting level design in the series. There’s tons of collectibles and each level has many different routes. If you compare the levels of Yoshi’s Island to Mario World, it’s clear that the former’s levels are much longer and more explorative.

Despite all the excellent level design and charm the game has going for it, there are some annoyances. The game manages to elevate player stress through its clever timer mechanic and crying Baby Mario. Should an enemy manage to land a hit on Yoshi, the little green dinosaur sheds Baby Mario from his back, and players are then forced to scramble their way back towards a crying Mario trapped in a floating bubble threatening to float away. We still hear that crying Mario in our dreams sometimes, and it’s one of the reasons this game isn’t higher than it is on the list.

12. Super Mario Bros. 2

Image Source: Nintendo

This unofficial sequel to the original Super Mario Bros game was actually a completely different game to begin with. Before the Mario title was added to the cartridge, Super Mario Bros 2 was actually a game called Yume Kōjō: Doki Doki Panic.

The resulting game is classic Mario gameplay with an action-adventure twist. Not only does the game introduce a new cast of characters in addition to Mario, each with their own unique abilities, but it also allows players to go on the offensive by throwing items at enemies. The dream-like nature of the levels makes progression interesting and refreshing, ensuring players never grow weary of whatever challenge lies ahead.

11. Super Mario Bros. Wonder

Image Source: Nintendo

The 10-year return of 2D Mario couldn’t have been better. Not only does Super Mario Wonder give Mario fans unique mechanics and gimmicks that surprise at every turn, but the game honors the series’ 30-year legacy with it’s familiar tight control scheme and classic roots. Super Mario Wonder feels like a modern-day Super Mario World; the secret exits, special world, and level design are prevelant in both games.

What sets this title apart is the fresh ideas and concepts across every level. This tremendous variety between levels makes the 2D Platforming genre fresh and exciting again, just when it was starting to feel overdone with Mario Maker 2. The only things keeping Super Mario Wonder from the taking the top spots on this list are its easy difficulty and derivative boss battles.

10. Super Mario 3D Land

Image Source: Nintendo

One of the few rare games to actually make excellent use of the 3DS’ 3D capabilities, Super Mario 3D Land brings the excellent design of 3D Mario games and squishes them into bite-sized chunks perfect for any road trip.

For those who aren’t big fans of New Super Mario’s gameplay, Super Mario 3D Land is intimate and puzzle-heavy. Perfect for player who want to feel invested in the portable world.

9. Super Mario Bros.

Image Source: Nintendo

The game that started a legacy, and provided the gaming industry the shot in the arm it needed to stay alive, Super Mario Bros is a definitive masterpiece.

In terms of design and mechanics, Super Mario Bros reinforces player expectations through thoughtful, unobtrusive “teaching” moments disguised as challenges. Many platformers look to the source for inspiration, even newer Mario games, but few come close to capturing the feel of of loading into world 1-1 for the first time.

8. Super Mario Sunshine

Image Source: Nintendo

Mario’s shift to a higher polygon count came with a fresh new coat of paint – literally. Sunshine introduces a new twist to the standard Mario gameplay by giving Mario access to a new world to play around in and a new tool: F.L.U.D.D.

This super-soaker backpack not only allows Mario to clean up the graffiti-drenched walls of the tropical Delfino Plaza, it also helps Mario traverse the land with new power-ups. Tired of walking from place to place? Slap on the jet, and race around the world at break-neck speeds. Having trouble with a distant platform? Switch nozzles to “hover,” and gracefully glide across the air.

Despite all the new additions to Mario’s repertoire and world, Sunshine falls painfully short of Super Mario 64’s open-world design by forcing players to return to the main hub world after completing any objective, as opposed to SM64’s design that allowed players to freely float from objective to objective at their leisure.

7. Super Mario 64

Image Source: Nintendo

Mario’s first appearance on the N64 shook the gaming world to the core. The 2D franchise was successfully brought into the third dimension, and showcased what a Z-axis provided for video games as a whole.

The brilliance of the game can be seen in the design of the Castle Courtyard seen shortly after Mario’s introduction. Players needed time to adjust to this added dimension of gameplay, and this courtyard served as a playground to see what new moves Mario picked up in the transition.

But Super Mario 64’s appeal isn’t limited to a retrospective glance. Despite being an early 3D hodgepodge of clumpy polygons, SM64 holds up remarkably well thanks to brilliant world design and challenges. Each new world introduced in SM64 adds a new layer of expectations for players, testing their mettle against the rising challenges presented as you progress throughout the game. Good luck acquiring all 120 stars though…

6. Super Mario 3D World

Image Source: Nintendo

Super Mario 3D World is a culmination of the cooperative mechanics introduced in the New Super Mario Bros. console games, with the thoughtful level design of the 3D Mario games.

3D World retains the charm of uncovering secrets strewn about the beautiful environments, while injecting a shot of stressful mania that comes about when one player decides to stray away and do things for themselves. Plus – cat suit power-ups!

5. Super Mario Galaxy 2

Image Source: Nintendo

The original Super Mario Galaxy was the first to bring players to space. Galaxy 2 was the reason for keeping them there. After having time to toy with 3D level design, Galaxy 2 features some of the most inventive level design in any Mario game.

But, the lack of any substantive hub world left the player rather lonely. Cohesion is an important part of tying all the levels together, and for Galaxy 2, it is sorely missed.

4. Super Mario Galaxy

Image Source: Nintendo

While Super Mario Sunshine shied away from the open level design of Super Mario 64, Galaxy retains it and brings it into the next logical representation of 3D space – space itself.

Bringing Mario to space brought with it an ability to overhaul traditional Nintendo level-design. While Galaxy 2 has arguably better level design, the original Galaxy has the luxury of being the first to wow audiences with a novel with a novel world….er, space.

3. Super Mario Odyssey

Image Source: Nintendo

Mario’s tremendous 3D streak reaches a climax with Super Mario Odyssey. This exemplifies the best in 3D platforming. Each stage is filled to the brim with creative challenges and fun collectibles. The hat transformations are a game-changer and completely freshen up the gameplay mechanics as if it were a different genre entierly at times.

There are no less than 50 hat transformations in Super Mario Odyssey, from a ridiculous T-Rex dinosaur to the series classic, Bullet Bill. This game is challenging, has tremendous depth, and has consistent quality through every single level. It’s also one of the very best Mario games of all time, so do yourself a favor and play it.

2. Super Mario Bros. 3

Image Source: Nintendo

In 1988 players all around the world thought that game developers had maximized the potential of what the NES hardware. Then Super Mario Bros. 3 released.

The world first gained a glimpse at the sequel to the beloved Mario Bros. franchise in the 80s film The Wizard, and what they glimpsed was a world of wonder and intrigue. SMB3 was completely different from the Mario games of the past. Sure – it still revolved around platforming, but now, Mario could bank power-ups, traverse floating airships, and utilize a wide variety of crazy new abilities that changed the fundamental nature of a Mario game.

1. Super Mario World

Image Source: Nintendo

Super Mario World debuted on the Super Nintendo in 1991 cementing Nintendo’s position as the premier console of the early 90s. Many games since have attempted at recreating the precise platforming, genuine feel-good momentum, and inventive power-up design, but none have come close to this platforming powerhouse.

Despite being a platformer, Super Mario World subverts the genre expectations by allowing players multiple ways of clearing new levels and old, thus incentivizing players to make their way back to previously completed locations. If you have yet to play this Mario masterpiece, you owe it to yourself to track down a copy.

And that does it for our ranking of the best Super Mario Bros. games. Be sure to search for Twinfinite for more Mario-related content, including a list of the weirdest Mario games you might’ve missed, as well as our Super Mario Bros. Wonder review and related guides!

About the author

Matthew Carmosino

Matthew Carmosino is a freelance writer for Twinfinite. He started gaming in the mid-90s where his love for SquareSoft RPGs like Chrono Trigger changed him forever. Matthew has been working in the game industry for two years covering everything from story-rich RPGs to puzzle-platformers.
Listening to piano music on a rainy day is his idea of a really good time, which probably explains his unnatural tolerance for level-grinding.

Matthew Carmosino

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October 26, 2023
The Best Werewolf Movies Ever, Ranked

*You’re back in middle school. It’s the first day of Sex Ed. The teacher writes a word you don’t know, “Puberty” on the blackboard and begins her lesson*

Puberty is an exciting, yet perplexing time in a young person’s life. You’ll go through so many changes, it’s almost like a complete transformation. You’ll soon become a hairy, slobbering, animalistic thing with absolutely no control over your desires. Like a werewolf! Yes, you’ll all turn into a pack of teen wolves! *titters*

So, to celebrate your upcoming transformations, I’m giving you all a special assignment! I’ve ranked the best werewolf movies of all time, and I’d like you all to write a report on how each of these movies relates to you.

Let’s go over them, shall we?

15. The Curse of the Werewolf

(Hammer Film Productions)

Terence Fisher’s The Curse of a Werewolf is a scary little flick from the 60s, but the action takes place in the 1700s! That’s right! People have been going through these kinds of “changes” since long before you kids were born! This film tells the story of a young man named Leon, who was born on Christmas Day. People believe that being born on such a date will cause him to lead a cursed life. How wrong they were! The circumstances surrounding the young man’s birth cause him to grow into a big, hairy wolfman! How lucky! The only problem is, the surrounding townsfolk don’t seem to think so.

14. Silver Bullet

(Paramount Pictures)

Daniel Attias’ Silver Bullet is inspired by a Stephen King story called Cycle of the Werewolf. And if Steve King knows anything about anything, it’s puberty! The film is about a paraplegic boy named Marty who is convinced that a werewolf is stalking his sleepy little town. After his sister builds Marty a wheelchair that doubles as a sweet motorcycle, they head to stop the monster!

13. Wolf

(Columbia Pictures)

How did A-list actor Jack Nicholson end up in Mike Nichols’ campy horror/drama film Wolf? Your guess is as good as mine! After a middle-aged book salesman is bitten by a werewolf, he begins to experience a pep in his step that he hasn’t felt since he was a teenager! And he uses it to eat would-be muggers in Central Park!

12. Trick’r Treat

Michael Dougherty’s Trick’r Treat is an anthology horror film about Halloween legends, but its werewolf story is one of the best around! Dressed as Little Red Riding Hood, a young girl named Laurie gets ready to go to a Halloween party with her friends. Along the way, they tease her and tell her to find a man at the party so she can have her “first time”. On the way to the party, she finds herself stalked by a masked man, but the real wolf in this situation is not who it seems!

11. Late Phases

(Dark Sky Films)

Adrián García Bogliano’s Late Phases seems like a werewolf film on the surface, but really it’s about father/son bonding! After all, who better to talk a young man through all the changes his body is going through than dear old dad? After the dear old dad in this film is moved into a retirement home by his estranged son, he realizes that the community is haunted by a werewolf. Father and son will have to team up in order to defeat the beast, and in doing so wrestle with an even bigger monster: male/male intimacy.

10. Teen Wolf

(Atlantic releasing corporation)

Teen Wolf is a clever little film about a nice young basketball player who begins undergoing some mysterious changes himself! He grows hair all over his body, and initially, it makes him so afraid that he quits his basketball team! Later at a party, he starts experiencing some urges towards one of the girls in his class, and it causes his hands to turn into claws! He goes home and talks to his father about it (something you boys should all do) and his father tells him that he too is a werewolf!

9. Wolfen

(Orion Pictures)

Now this movie is a little bit … scarier. But I assure you, puberty is nothing to be afraid of! As you experience these “changes” in your body, you might find yourself getting a little… emotional. You might find you want to yell into a pillow or punch a wall. You might even find that you want to maul a person to death. But don’t do that now! Or else you’ll turn up like the werewolf in this film! This werewolf attracts the attention of an NYPD detective on the mean streets of New York City who is trying to solve a series of grisly animal attacks! Wouldn’t want to end up in jail now, would you?

8. The Wolf of Snow Hollow

(Orion Classics)

Here’s another film about a werewolf who couldn’t control their urges and becomes the target of law enforcement! Except this movie takes place in a little mountain town in Utah! See, it’s not just big city people who go become werewolves—I mean, experience puberty. Everybody does it! The unfortunate thing for these townspeople is that one particular werewolf isn’t doing a very good job of controlling their new urges. The results aren’t pretty. But I know you students can do better!

7. Werewolves Within

(Ubisoft Film & Television)

This goofy little movie is all the more proof that there’s a werewolf in all of us! It’s about another small little town (I’m sensing a theme!) that begins to experience a number of mysterious maulings in the night. First, a poor little doggie is killed, then people start turning up dead. The townspeople eventually start to lose trust in each other, and accusations are thrown about. Eventually, the werewolf isn’t the only thing in the little town that turns to violence. May this movie be a lesson for you to be patient with your peers, even if one of you turns up dead. After all, they’re going through the same thing you are!

6. The Howling

(International Film Investors / Wescom Productions)

The Howling is another movie on this list that’s on the darker side. It’s about a news anchor named Karen who suffers amnesia while she’s helping the police catch a serial killer who’s been stalking her. At the urging of her therapist, she and her husband go away to a sleepy little therapeutic resort to rest and recuperate. Eventually, Karen and her husband begin to experience strange goings-on at the resort, as the people there may all be suffering from a supernatural sort of ailment, if you catch my drift. But don’t worry, children, puberty isn’t supernatural. It just feels like you’re turning into a hideous monster sometimes.

5. Dog Soldiers

(Kismet Entertainment Group)

Sometimes, children, puberty is going to feel like a war that you’re fighting with yourself. You versus the ferocious and uncontrollable beast inside of you. You simply have to soldier on, just like the brave men in this film! They’re a group of soldiers who quite literally have to fight a horde of ferocious beasts. The film is about a squad of British soldiers who come across the scene of a massacre while on a training exercise on a full-moonlit night. The men realize that something is hunting them, and they have to take shelter in a spooky old farmhouse to wait out the night. Maybe we should lock you all in farmhouses in order to protect you from yourselves!

4. The Company of Wolves

(Palace Pictures / ITC Entertainment)

When experiencing puberty, you may find that you start having certain kinds of dreams. If these dreams are about some teen heart-throb on the TikTok, that’s normal. However, if they’re about being chased by slavering packs of feral canines, that might be something to tell an adult about. But you’re not alone! Because that’s exactly what happens to the heroine of this film! Eventually, this young lady meets a handsome hunter in the forest, and discovers that she has an animalistic attraction to him! Again, this is totally normal! Unless of course supernatural wolves are involved. In which case, please see your guidance counselor.

3. Ginger Snaps

(Lionsgate)

Oh, this is one of the best coming-of-age werewolf movies there is! It’s about two young women named Ginger and Bridgette who live in a sleepy little part of suburbia. One night, Ginger gets something called her “period.” It’s something we’re going to cover in detail later, but, um … blood is involved. The scent of her blood causes her to be attacked by a creature in the night. However, she discovers that the next day her wounds have all healed! Her sister Bridgette senses that something is wrong, however, and has to figure out a way to save Ginger from the lupine fate that awaits her!

2. The Wolf Man

(Universal)

If you learn anything from this film, children, it’s that people have been going through puberty for generations, even those old-timey people who talk in those funny accents! It’s about a man who, due to his unstrained urges, buys an antique silver cane in order to impress the cute shopkeeper. As he is walking home, he is attacked by a wolf! He thwacks it to death with his fancy new cane, but he later learns that he has actually murdered a man! Later on, he meets a Romani woman who tells him that he killed her son and that he is now a werewolf! Let it be a lesson to you, children, never spend money on “drip” in order to “stunt” on a “shortie.” You’ll only end up hurting yourself!

1. An American Werewolf In London

(Universal Pictures)

Here it is, children, the greatest werewolf film of all time! The film was probably inspired by a very talented man named Warren Zevon, who wrote what you children would call a “banger” about werewolves in the United Kingdom! It’s about two young men named Jack and David who are attacked by a wolf while backpacking through the British countryside on a moonlit night. Poor Jack is killed by the wolf, while the other boy David survives. However, David soon begins having some strange dreams! He begins dreaming about his best friend (something many of you children may soon experience for yourselves) who warns David that he didn’t come out of the attack unscathed. David is cursed to go through a series of extraordinary changes himself!

Just like you adorable children are cursed to turn into filthy teenagers! The film features perhaps the greatest werewolf transformation ever recorded, and the sequence is set to another “banger” called “Bad Moon Rising,” written by Mr. John Fogarty of Creedence Clearwater Revival. My stars, I sure had some urges having to do with that man when I was your age!

Well children, I certainly hope that clears up some of your questions about puberty. Now, if you all will please open your textbooks to page – oh no! I’ll have none of that eye-rolling sass! Like you, I’m rather tired myself. I had a rather late night last night. I can simply never sleep during a full moon, but I haven’t the faintest idea why!

*burps up a human ear*

On second thought, class dismissed.

(featured image: Universal Pictures)

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Jack Doyle

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October 25, 2023