Pop Culture Happy Hour

A gambler, a rock, a ring, and Kevin Garnett are the primary ingredients in Uncut Gems , a thriller directed by Josh and Benny Safdie. Adam Sandler stars as compulsive gambler Howard Ratner, and the film is so tense that calling it tense seems completely inadequate.

From 2004 to 2009, the Showtime TV drama The L Word examined the lives of a group of queer women in L.A. The show was uneven, but it also marked an important milestone for queer representation on television. Now, the series has a sequel called The L Word: Generation Q . It's moved to a different L.A. neighborhood, it's added a diverse cast of new young stars, and it catches us up on the lives of Bette, Alice, and Shane, among others.

The war epic 1917 startled a lot of awards watchers Sunday night when it won the Golden Globe for best dramatic film. That's in part because it's just now going into wide release. 1917 is directed by Sam Mendes and follows two young World War I soldiers who are sent on a dangerous mission to deliver a crucial message. And just to increase the level of difficulty a little, the whole movie is crafted to look like one continuous shot.

We've just gotten done watching the Golden Globes. In TV, Succession , Fleabag , and Chernobyl won multiple awards. As for the movies, big winners included 1917 , Once Upon A Time In Hollywood , Joaquin Phoenix, Renée Zellweger, Awkwafina, and Taron Egerton. We saw big speeches, a few surprises, and lifetime achievement prizes for Ellen DeGeneres and Tom Hanks.

Created by Marta Kauffman and David Crane, Friends was little more than a bunch of pals who hung out, dated and broke up with each other and a variety of guest stars, and had unrealistically large apartments. But 25 years later, it's still popular in endless reruns and on Netflix.