Paula’s Pop Week: “You can’t sit with us!”

Universal wants to boycott TikTok, Musicians want to boycott Israel, BMG wants to boycott Roger Waters, Kim Virginia wants Leyla Mike to boycott, Nicki Minaj to boycott Megan Thee Stallion or vice versa, Swifties to boycott AI images, this one sweet person boycotts the idea, DM me again, but guys… I wish we could all get along like we used to in middle school!

Who is boycotting whom here? Green Day and Trump’s America

Green Day changed the lyrics to “American Idiot” at New Year’s Rockin’ Eve in New York. “I’m not a part of a redneck agenda” became “I’m not a part of the MAGA agenda.”

So far, so normal for Green Day. The audience went crazy anyway because it’s a pop hit. I thought it was only us Germans who didn’t really listen to the lyrics because we only spoke English so well, but do English-speaking people do that too? There is no other way to explain the subsequent surprise that Green Day are against right-wing honks. The internet was piqued. Are Green Day… heaven forbid… LEFT? But then things got even crazier.

Elon Musk announced on So rich, right-wing people now think they are punks, woke is mainstream and being conservative is progressive and Snoop Dogg is a Trump supporter and people who shout along don’t listen and think “American Idiot” is apolitical, I can’t handle it anymore.

Punk as a term really doesn’t mean anything anymore, at least the word is dead. That’s it. After all, even if the New Year’s performance was reminiscent of Campino at Oktoberfest, Green Day remain stable – and recently, 20 years after “American Idiot”, they simply released another anti-American album (SAVIORS).

Where were the petitions here? The remake of “Mean Girls”

I was benevolent as fuck, I wanted it to be good. No, I don’t think everything used to be better, on the contrary. My favorite film “Mean Girls” is being re-released after 20 years? As a musical? With Reneé Rapp as Regina George? I’m so into it!

At first I wanted to convince a bunch of people to go in there with me because it’s such a big deal for me that this movie is finally out. But most of them were like, “Oh, I only know half of the original…”, while I can, without exaggeration, speak all the dialogue. Luckily I preferred to go alone; I would have been completely ashamed. It was so boring. Unfortunately!

Of course it’s nice to see a few familiar faces again – Tina Fey (no aged) and Tim Meadows as teachers, who are (finally!) a couple this time, and of course Lindsay Lohan. There may have been more reunions, but I forgot. Apart from Rapp and Auli’i Cravalho (totally great as the new Janis), the cast is rather poor (Busy Phillipps as Regina George’s mother is perfectly cast, but, like everyone else, plays far too reserved). The Netflix principle of the last few years was used: the main character is white and thin, with various people around him who help the white, thin main character to find himself.

The whole principle of the first “Mean Girls”, which was a satire on these white Queen Bees, somehow no longer works here. The dialogues, even if some of them were taken exactly from the first film, no longer work, the jokes are lame, some of the old jokes are even destroyed because they are explained, the characters are no longer exaggerated and over the top (as I said except for Rapp and Cravalho). It’s like the air has been sucked out of them.

The songs are bad! They don’t catch anything, and sometimes they’re even downright embarrassing. And I say that as a big fan of “High School Musical,” “Camp Rock,” “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” and the musical episode of “Buffy”!

For some reason there are always breasts in the picture? I don’t understand any of this, it’s nothing. And who should the film be for? For nostalgics like me or for the new teenagers? Apart from me, only the second group was in the film. They never laughed. They only screamed once, and that was when they saw Aaron Samuels’ new actor – I have to google it – his name is Christopher Briney, well known from “The Summer I Turned Pretty”.

No. Save your money and watch “Bottoms” on Prime Video instead. This is a totally surprising, funny and at times weird film starring the incredible Ayo Edebiri (“The Bear”) and Rachel Sennott. Two lesbian friends are looking for true love and for this reason they start a fight club at their school.

The Boycott Awards

Place 3: I know a new English word: snub. Snub, snub, snub, that’s what the online media has been saying all the time, because Margot Robbie and Greta Gerwig won’t get an Oscar. It must be because of misogyny, many thought, and of course everything in Hollywood is because of misogyny. This latest scandal certainly does too. But I think the “Barbie” film, in cooperation with the toy manufacturer Mattel, through which blonde and young and slim was once again visible everywhere as the dominant ideal of femininity (yes, the various marginal characters, I know), also exists because of that Misogyny. That’s why it all fits somehow, they all deserve each other and it’s also really fitting that Ryan Gosling is nominated for best SUPPORTING ACTOR? He then made a very good statement. Everything is sweet. He really was so great as Ken!

Place 2: At this price there doesn’t seem to be any concerns about the content, but rather the quality. The GrimmePrize nominations this year indicate that there weren’t enough good contenders, broken down here by Deutschlandfunk:

My theory: The media libraries are too confusing, you hardly get to hear anything, including the Grimme Prize ones. In the meantime, I recommend “Capital B – Who Owns Berlin” to you – a very good documentary about how investor assholes have been destroying a city together with neoliberal politics since the fall of the Wall, and “PRESSURE”the charming and entertaining teen series that I still hope will have a new season at some point.

1st place: ESC! Here we go again… Whenever people notice that Israel is taking part in the Eurovision Song Contest, the supposedly non-political event that brings people together suddenly becomes totally political. It was to be expected that things would escalate in this regard this year. Now over 1,000 Swedish musicians have actually signed an open letter demanding that the Israelis not come. To be honest, I only know about three of the acts.

In fact, it wouldn’t be the first time that the ESC excluded a country from the contest; Russia and Belarus were also not allowed to take part for political reasons. Maybe you should slowly decide whether you are just for the people and the culture, whether there is such a thing as being apolitical and how you behave towards double standards. Until then, Robyn just has to dance on her own.

And there’s something else you probably won’t be able to get into any time soon: Pitchfork. This is actually swallowed up by GQ. Yes, that’s really shitty news. But we’re getting through this, aren’t we? You can write open or closed letters as you like!

What happened until now? Here is an overview of all the pop column texts.