
‘Rick and Morty' Is Getting a Presidential Spin-Off
The President's clashes with Rick go all the way back to the season two episode 'Get Schwifty'—and he's popped up several times since then, usually beefing with Rick and/or getting himself involved in something very un-presidential. There was that time he transformed into a turkey, as well as the time he dropped a lightsaber at the exact wrong angle and very nearly destroyed the Earth's core. He recently tried out being a hive mind as part of an ill-fated scheme to raise his approval ratings. Also, don't ask him to take a selfie with you. Just don't.
President Curtis was co-created by Rick and Morty executive producers Dan Harmon and James Siciliano. According to an Adult Swim press release, the series 'follows the Commander-in-Chief and his eccentric staff as they tackle the kind of crises Rick Sanchez could never be bothered with—from interdimensional diplomacy to paranormal investigations and unexplained phenomena.'
Members of that eccentric staff will include characters voiced by Community's Jim Rash and Brooklyn Nine-Nine's Stephanie Beatriz.
David appeared at the Rick and Morty San Diego Comic-Con panel to announce the news. In the press release, he sounded as excited as fans will surely be. 'President Curtis has always been a blast to play. Getting to explore his world more deeply in this new series is a dream. I can't wait for fans to see what kind of chaos he stirs up when Rick isn't around to steal the spotlight.'
Harmon and Siciliano called President Curtis 'one of our favorite characters to write,' noting, 'He's the only person in the multiverse who can go toe-to-toe with Rick and still hold office. Now we finally get to go on sci-fi missions from Curtis' point of view. And with Keith David leading the charge, it's going to be a wild ride.'
Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what's next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.
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'It's similar to how Swifties treat Taylor Swift,' she said, referring to the now-34-year-old pop star. 'You have young women 'looking out for' a billionaire woman in her 30s. I'm a fan of Taylor Swift, but I don't think she needs protecting from Travis Kelce because Travis Kelce got in the face of his NFL coach during the Super Bowl.' The anti-age-gap sentiment held by many plays into the 'puriteen' narrative that's been inescapable lately. Online, there's a lot of hand-wringing over Gen Zers' seeming aversion to sex: Studies show that they're having less of it than earlier generations and that they don't want sex scenes in their movies. Though Amelia overall disagrees with age-gap critics ― she feels like their arguments rob women of their agency, she said ― she gets where those in her peer group are coming from. 'The majority of us had unsupervised internet access from a young age. We were in chatrooms, on Tumblr, and other various corners of the internet that we probably should not have been on at that age,' she said. 'It was easy for grown men on the internet to reach us if they wanted to.' If you've been oversexualized at a young age ― or seen others in your age bracket be oversexualized ― that experience is understandably going to shape how you perceive these kinds of things, Amelia said. But the reality is, there are likely just as many happy May-December unions as there are disappointing ones. 'Believe it or not, we often see more ― not less ― equity in these relationships,' Lehmiller noted. All of the Gen Zers we spoke to said that ultimately, two consenting adults can do whatever they want in their private lives, even if others find it off-putting. 'Men can like women that are younger and not be a creep,' Amelia said. 'He also can be a creep, but some random person with a Twitter cartoon avatar shouldn't necessarily be the judge of that!' This article originally appeared on HuffPost. Solve the daily Crossword


WIRED
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Do You Need a Barbecue Knife?
These specialty blades—cutlass-shaped mini machetes made for chopping grilled and smoked meats—aren't a necessary addition to your grill game. But they're fun, and they get the job done. Courtesy of Schmidt Brothers/Messermeister All products featured on WIRED are independently selected by our editors. However, we may receive compensation from retailers and/or from purchases of products through these links. A while back at my favorite kitchen-gear trade show, I spotted what appeared to be a trending category: barbecue knives. Their distinguishing characteristics seem to be a fairly tall blade, a shape that encourages a wokka-wokka–style rocking motion, and a target audience that skews heavily toward dudes with beards. Not all of those traits scream 'great for grilling,' but I was intrigued. One question immediately stuck in my head: What, if anything, makes a knife grill-friendly? 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'I tell them they'll be able to do 90 percent of everything they need to do and be way happier doing it 'cause they've got a superior product,' Tate says. Courtesy of Messermeister Charmed Knife Though I didn't smell a rat, something felt just a little bit made up about this knife style, so I called a couple of them in for testing. First to arrive was the eight-inch Messermeister Avanta Kendrick BBQ Knife, with a swashbuckler vibe, a curved spine (the top of the blade), a handle that continued that arc upward, and the sides of the blade painted black. (If you need even more macho than all that, check out the video.) The knife is a bit blade-heavy, a style that is not my jam, but it felt good to wield. Messermeister is a well-respected brand among both pro chefs and home cooks. Chad Ward, author of An Edge In The Kitchen , calls one of Messermeister's traditional nine-inch chef's knives 'just about perfect.' 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