THE UNDERGROUND — ISSUE #44
Everything you need to know about in this weekly series: How to use spices, learn something new every minute with this awesome website, a complete destruction of the Star Wars prequels, how the Dark Net is becoming mainstream, and a new film by the Coen brothers.
At Social Underground we go beyond the mainstream stuff and see what’s underneath the surface. What should we get into, listen to, read, eat or watch? If there is something in our culture that needs attention that’s our job: Show you the underground things that you need to know about: Books, music, television, movies, comedians, art, and whatever else we can find to get you into something you never knew about. That’s The Underground.
1. How to use spices and when to mix spices. Let’s be honest: We all have that cupboard full of spices that we throw on our steaks and in our stews but aren’t sure if they do anything. The only time I knew what to put in a dish was when I would visit a Mongolian BBQ and they had an ingredient listing for each dish so you could know what to put in. Other than that, I would put salt and pepper on my steak. That was the limit to my knowledge until I realized that cooking was fun, and women like men who can cook something other than take-out.
Here is a handy guide that will show you what spices go with what so that when you make some food, you aren’t just mixing random shit together like a monster that will ruin food for you and whomever you serve.
2. Factoclock gives you a new fact every minute. Do you have a friend that will randomly drop a random fact of knowledge on your that makes you go “Oh, cool. I didn’t know that.” Well, Factoclock will give you a random fact every minute as long as you’re on the webpage. I have had it open for a few days and just stare at it waiting for the next random interesting fact to come up. It gets addicting because KNOWLEDGE IS POWER!
Have a look at the site to learn some awesome facts that you can use in small talk or to sound smart. Or, you know, you can just enlighten yourself with facts. I’m sure we all want to hear your knowledge of Game of Thrones, but real facts are a bit more interesting.
3. Remember how bad the Star Wars prequels were with this brutal takedown of each one. Remember how in the first Star Wars film it starts out pretty simple: Alien planet, and then it pans up to a smaller ship being shot at by a bigger ship. We know who is good, who is bad, and that it’s space movie. SIMPLE. At the beginning of Phantom Menace, there is a meeting about the trade federation, racist Asian stereotypical alien, and boring green screen action. I still don’t even know what it was about.
Red Letter Media took it upon themselves to not only review how bad it was, no, they have absolutely destroyed it. The review of Revenge of the Sith is almost the length of the movie movie itself. I have to give credit to the movies, however. If they didn’t exist, they wouldn’t of allowed for these reviews to happen.
Mr. Plinkett’s Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace Review
Mr. Plinkett’s Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones Review
Mr. Plinkett’s Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith Review
If you want to laugh hard at a guy take each movie down brick by brick, then strap in and watch all of these.
4. TED Talk’s Jamie Bartlett explains the Dark Net and how it’s becoming mainstream. In this video, Bartlett tells the audience what the Dark Net is, how you can access it, and how your mind will be completely blown by what you can access or get on the Dark Net that you had no idea about.
It all starts with the Tor network. It’s a different browser that allows you to access sites that give you access to illegally pirated books, guerilla blogs… and of course drugs and other horrible stuff. This is a reason why I don’t go near it. Whenever there is a place you can buy drugs, you can probably find other stuff that is even more illegal. The kind of stuff you see people get arrested for and say, “That guy should be shot on the spot.”
Yeah, it’s that type of world. It’s the type of world that mainstream news sources don’t really understand. For example, CNN thought a hacker named “4chan” hacked the cloud and got all of those celebrity naked pictures.
That is how little is known by most people. And as you know from the CNN video above, they don’t really do their research.
I’ll let this guy explain it all, and then you’ll proceed to go exploring.
5. The new Hail, Caesar trailer promises a return to the funny Coen Bros. If you have seen a film by the Coen’s, then you know just how genius they can be. Fargo (1996), The Big Lebowski (1998), O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), No Country for Old Men (2007), Burn After Reading (2008), A Serious Man (2009), True Grit (2010), and Inside Llewyn Davis (2013). I mean, talk about an amazing resume.
So what’s Hail, Caesar! all about?
Synopsis: Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin) is a Hollywood “fixer” helping the production of the upcoming film entitled Hail Caesar starring Baird Whitlock (George Clooney). When Whitlock is kidnapped by a group named “The Future,” Mannix is the one in charge of collecting 100,000 dollars and rescuing him.
Yeah, judging by the trailer, it’s going to be funny with the entire cast acting their asses off. Check out the trailer below for what will probably be yet another film by the Coen’s that will get all the nominations.
Feature Photo: Greg Owens NPR
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Jeff Sorensen is an author, writer and occasional comedian living in Detroit, Michigan. You can look for more of his work on The Huffington Post, UPROXX, BGR and by just looking up his name.
Contact: jeff@socialunderground.com