A New Pope, The New Avengers, Met Gala, Italian Brainrot and viral songs
Vol. 2 Issue 19 – 10th May 2025
The internet was obsessed with…
Conclave: The conclave happened. A new pope was elected. He is an American, a first. From Chicago. Before the conclave, the cardinals were made to watch the movie Conclave (2024) to familiarise themselves with the voting process. The new pope has the same birthday as Trisha Paytas’ daughter Malibu Barbie and has studied mathematics. The X/Twitter parody account Pope Crave beat most media outlets in announcing the selection of the new pope. Oh, and Harry Styles was in the audience at Pope Leo’s first appearance.
Met Gala: This year’s exhibit, theme, and dress code celebrate Black fashion, particularly the wave of Dandyism. I will leave the breakdown of the fashion and accordance to the theme to the experts; here are a few moments from the night that did catch my (and the internet’s) attention, though.
Anna Wintour had a stain on her dress, and co-chairs Colman Domingo and Lewis Hamilton looked at her like that™️
Zendaya and Anna Sawai showed up in veryyy similar outfits and this was Zendaya’s stylist Law Roach’s reaction
Rihanna is pregnant for the third time!
Louis Partridge looking like he stepped out of an early 2000s Disney Channel original movie with that fedora
Diljeet Dosanjh paying an ode to the Indian dandy but being denied a necklace, which shockingly was available to be loaned to Emma Chamberlain for the Met Gala a few years back?
Interviewers not doing their research and not knowing who Shah Rukh Khan was
People thinking Lisa wore panties with Rosa Parks’ face on them but it was later clarified, that it was a bodysuit and not Rosa Parks on them, but others who have inspired her. Still an odd placement choice.
Italian brainrot memes: Ballerina Cappucina. Tralalero Tralala. Tung Tung Tung Sahur. Bombardiro Crocodilo.
Do these names make no sense to you? Consider yourself lucky because they seem to have taken over everyone’s algorithms. These are the names of AI-generated Italian characters, with full-fledged backstories. They make no sense, there’s no rhyme or reason for them, it’s just pure brain rot.
The New Avengers: Spoiler alert but also not? Since it’s all over Marvel’s socials anyway. The Thunderbolts*, since its announcement, was marketed with an asterisk at the end, but never explained. In the movie’s final scene, and now posters everywhere, this has been revealed to be done to gatekeep the real identity of the team aka The New Avengers.
The cast tore through the old poster at a premiere event, Sebastian Stan was spotted replacing the old posters around LA, the original Avengers X/Twitter account now has a © copyright mark referencing the end-credit scene of the film where the group debates that Anthony Mackie’s Cap’s Avengers aren’t the only Avengers. And in a Disney cross-promotional strategy, the new poster of The New Avengers is seen being torn through yet again, to reveal Stitch, as the live-action Lilo and Stitch releases at the end of this month.
Watch out
Donald Trump has now introduced tariffs on movies that are filmed outside the United States of America. Currently, multiple big-budget movies like Avengers: Doomsday, Avatar 4 and Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey are in production abroad.
A Best Podcast category will be introduced at the Golden Globes in 2026!
Timothee Chalamet and Kylie Jenner made their red carpet debut in Italy, at the 70th David di Donatello ceremony in Rome. The two were stuck to the hip the whole night and reporting on it on X/Twitter, Vanity Fair name-dropped Chalamet superfan (more like, unhealthily obsessed, in her 60s, will crop Kylie out of every picture, kinda fan) “Club Chalamet”. While the club chalamet lore online goes pretty deep and the chronically online internet users love ribbing/referencing it time and again, I don’t know how to feel about a mainstream publication blurring the lines and encouraging that account further…
The bestselling book series Off-Campus is being adapted by Amazon Prime Video, starting with book 1, The Deal. The cast has just been announced.
New Trailers:
Honey Don’t!- Margaret Qualley plays a lesbian detective and Chris Evans plays a hot priest.
Peacemaker S2- John Cena is back in James Gunn’s superhero show.
Materialists- The first reviews are out, and Celine Song is being touted as the reviver of romcoms, with praises all around for the cast of Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans and Pedro Pascal. The new trailer takes inspo from the romcoms of an era gone by, with a 90s style voiceover.
Together- A supernatural body horror movie starring Alison Brie and James Franco.
The Conjuring: Last Rites- Another one for the horror fans, a teaser into the last movie of the Conjuring franchise.
Speaking of trailers, here’s the trailer for GTA VI, releasing on 26th May 2026.
The White Lotus alum, Patrick Schwarzenegger, is being eyed to lead the American Psycho remake to play Patrick Bateman, and he is also rumoured to be a part of the new X-Men movie, to play Cyclops.
In other news
After the blackouts in parts of Europe last week, Paris witnessed a hailstorm at the beginning of May, which is supposed to be the start of summer.
Lea Michele has finally addressed the conspiracy theories on influencer Jake Shane’s podcast and proved that she can, in fact, read and is literate.
The Alpine team in Formula 1 pulled a Red Bull Racing move and switched their driver line-up after only six races. Franco Colapinto, who made an impressive debut last season will be replacing Jack Doohan, for at least the next five races.
Sound off
Lady Gaga's free Copacabana beach show in Brazil became the biggest standalone concert ever in history, with a whopping 2.1 million attendees! Rumour has it that Beyonce is in talks to perform at Copacabana next year.
Trending Now:
Ordinary by Alex Warren- It’s been a few months since this song has been trending and has since gone Number 1. A love song that first went viral on BookTok and slowly took over everyone’s feeds.
undressed by sombr- In particular, the lyrics, “I don't want the children of another man to have the eyes of the girl I won't forget”.
Pretty Little Baby by Connie Francis- This song from 1962 is going viral after a few people covered it, and is now being used for edits.
Lorde has announced her Ultrasound World Tour, Bad Bunny has also announced his DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS World Tour, which funnily does not include any American concert dates.
Currently wayyy under the radar, Gracie Abrams’ friend and frequent writing collaborator, Audrey Hobert has released her debut single, Sue Me. A talent to watch out for…
