‘Duster' takes a rip-roaring ride
Josh Holloway and Rachel Hilson star in the '70s crime thriller series about a mob getaway driver and a young FBI agent. David Daniel has a look.
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Fox News
12 minutes ago
- Fox News
Paramount controlling shareholder Shari Redstone diagnosed with thyroid cancer
Media mogul Shari Redstone, CBS parent Paramount's controlling shareholder, has been diagnosed with thyroid cancer. "Shari Redstone was diagnosed with thyroid cancer earlier this spring. While it has been a challenging period, she is maintaining all professional and philanthropic activities throughout her treatment, which is ongoing. She and her family are grateful that her prognosis is excellent," Redstone's spokesperson told Fox News Digital. The 71-year-old has frequently been in the news this year as she seeks the Trump administration's approval of a multibillion-dollar planned merger with Skydance Media and has given lawyers the green light to settle President Donald Trump's election interference lawsuit against CBS News, although no deal has been reached. Redstone wanted the opinion of doctors "about two months ago after experiencing fatigue and other symptoms," according to The New York Times, which first reported the diagnosis. She underwent surgery in May. The Times noted that she was quickly diagnosed and surgeons removed her thyroid gland but were unable to remove all the cancer cells because they'd spread to her vocal cords. Redstone controls more than three-quarters of Paramount's Class A voting shares through National Amusements, the company she took control of in 2016 when her media mogul father, Sumner Redstone, was deemed too incapacitated to run the company. He died in 2020. Redstone, who recused herself from settlement discussions related to the Trump lawsuit in February, isn't thrilled with being tied up in litigation with the sitting president and wants to get things resolved. Fox News Digital confirmed last week that Trump rejected a $15 million offer to settle his lawsuit. The talks are ongoing, but the president's legal team is demanding at least $25 million and an apology from CBS News. Many industry insiders believe the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will wait until the lawsuit is in the rearview mirror before deciding if the planned merger with Skydance Media will be approved. Redstone is set for a significant windfall if she's able to flip Paramount to Skydance. Bloomberg reported last year that she would receive $180 million in severance on top of the roughly $350 million she would pocket from the merger. Skydance Media CEO David Ellison, who would take control of CBS as head of the newly formed Paramount Skydance Corp. if the merger is finalized, was aware of Redstone's cancer diagnosis, according to the Times.
USA Today
15 minutes ago
- USA Today
Why wasn't an Amber Alert sent for the 3 sisters found dead in Washington?
Why wasn't an Amber Alert sent for the 3 sisters found dead in Washington? Show Caption Hide Caption New footage of Travis Decker released amid manhunt Travis Decker is wanted on first-degree murder charges in connection with deaths of his three daughters. The deaths of three girls in Washington state whose mother reported them missing after their father didn't return them from a custodial visit, has prompted cries for reform because an Amber Alert was never sent for the sisters. The bodies of Paityn Decker, 9; Evelyn Decker, 8; and Olivia Decker, 5, were discovered on June 2 – just days after they were reported missing by their mother, Whitney Decker. The three girls did not return home from a planned visitation with their father, Travis Decker, a former military member who is homeless and was living out of a pickup. Authorities found the girls' bodies about 75 to 100 yards away from their father's unoccupied vehicle near the Rock Island Campground in Chelan County, about 148 miles east of Seattle. The FBI, Homeland Security Investigations, U.S. Marshals, and U.S. Border Patrol have joined the search for Travis Decker, whose whereabouts remain unknown. Now, Whitney Decker is calling for changes to Washington state's Amber Alert system and improvements in mental health care for veterans as the search for the man stretched into its sixth day on June 6, according to reports. Washington State Patrol was originally contacted on May 30 to request an Amber Alert, but the situation "did not meet the required criteria" at the time, Wenatchee police said. The agency instead issued a statewide Endangered Missing Person Alert (EMPA) for the girls on May 31. As authorities intensify the search for Travis Decker, 32, a family attorney told local media outlets that Whitney Decker believes her daughters might still be alive had an Amber Alert been issued in the hours after they were reported missing. "She really feels that the system let her children down," Attorney Arianna Cozart said in an interview with KING 5. "It was the inadequacies in the services for our veterans that killed those children." Court filings revealed that Travis Decker had exhibited mental health issues prior to the girls' deaths. Cozart told The Seattle Times that Travis Decker had been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder and complex post-traumatic stress disorder after leaving active service. "They did not see him as an immediate physical danger to his children, despite the fact that he had a well established history of mental health issues," Cozart added. "And had they had seen it that way, those children might still be alive. And that's the thing that is so brutal, and the one thing she's really hoping can be changed in this tragedy." Cozart did not immediately respond to USA TODAY's request for comment on June 5. 'One too many': Death of 3 girls in Travis Decker's custody is a familiar tragedy Why wasn't an Amber Alert issued? Chris Loftis, spokesperson for the Washington State Patrol, reiterated to USA TODAY that the request for an Amber Alert did not meet the system's guidelines, which are set by the U.S. Department of Justice. He said that, similar to other states, Washington's system has "specific criteria" to ensure that features of the program are only used in instances where the standards have been met. According to Loftis, the criteria include: "The person(s) must be 17 or younger." "The incident must be investigated by a law enforcement agency, and the subject must be entered into the National Crime Information Center." "There must be enough descriptive information that activating the alert will assist in the recovery." "There must be reason to believe the person has been abducted." "The missing person(s) must be known to be in danger of imminent serious bodily injury or death." While the first three criteria were met, Loftis said Travis Decker had limited custodial rights, and there was not immediate legal presumption that the girls were abducted when the Amber Alert requests were submitted on May 30 and May 31. He added that law enforcement does not "automatically have clear indication that the children are in danger" in situations where a custodial parent is late returning children to another parent. Loftis noted that discussions with local law enforcement did not mention danger as a concern. Citing notes from the intake specialist for Washington State Patrol's Missing and Unidentified Persons Unit, Loftis said initial and follow-up reports from local police stated there was no threat of great bodily harm or death to the children at the time. The notes also showed that Travis Decker had previously "never diverted from the parenting plan in the past" and "no alarming mental health status" had been mentioned in the reports, other than "he may be 'going through a lot' after leaving the military and weathering housing and employment issues." 'No set of standards can protect us from all evils and horrors' Though the case did not meet the Amber Alert threshold, Loftis said there was "ample concern" and State Patrol had enough information to issue the EMPA. Unlike an Amber Alert, the EMPA does not send a push notification or text message to all cell phones in the targeted area about missing children. According to Loftis, issuing an EMPA allows law enforcement to post electronic fliers, send text messages and emails to listservs of people who have requested notification on all alerts, post vehicle information on highway reader boards, and promote coverage by state broadcasters. "The State of Washington handled this incident no differently than any other state with the information they had available. But all of that said, nothing, no process, and no set of standards can protect us from all evils and horrors," Loftis said in a statement to USA TODAY. "We learn from every tragedy, and I'm sure we will review and learn from this set of tragedies, but the depth of this sorrow is beyond a learning opportunity right now, it is a tragedy first and forever." Community mourns amid manhunt: Who were Olivia, Evelyn and Paityn Decker? What happened to the three sisters? The three girls were found dead by apparent suffocation in a remote campground, according to the Wenatchee Police Department. Whitney Decker had reported the children missing on May 30 after they left their central Washington home to visit their father. On June 2, a Chelan County deputy found an unoccupied truck at about 3:45 p.m. local time near the Rock Island Campground. Officers found the bodies of the missing girls soon after, down a small embankment, according to a probable cause affidavit obtained by USA TODAY. While Travis Decker was nowhere to be found, investigators traced his cell phone, which revealed that he visited the same campground the day before the kidnapping, the court documents show. Travis Decker is wanted on charges of kidnapping, first-degree murder, and custodial interference in connection with the deaths, according to the Wenatchee Police Department. In an update on June 4, Chelan County Sheriff Mike Morrison said Travis Decker may have scoped out a hiding location before going off the grid using his extensive military and outdoor survival training. Contributing: Natalie Neysa Alund, Anthony Robledo, and Jeanine Santucci, USA TODAY
The Verge
20 minutes ago
- The Verge
Mission to Zyxx's creators are laughing their way through the sci-fi spinoff boom
Charles Pulliam-Moore is a reporter focusing on film, TV, and pop culture. Before The Verge, he wrote about comic books, labor, race, and more at io9 and Gizmodo for almost five years. When Mission to Zyxx debuted in 2017, the podcasting space was very different. There were fewer shows, and more money was being spent as companies rushed to figure out how to capitalize on the growing medium. At a time when many big podcasts were focused on news and investigative reporting, Zyxx — an improvised comedy about a group of alien diplomats journeying across the galaxy in search of adventure — felt like an oddity that was channeling the spirit of classic radio dramas. The show was a loving sendup of Star Wars and Star Trek 's most iconic (and ridiculous) narrative beats. And while nostalgia was a big part of Zyxx 's appeal, meticulous sound design and inspired, on-the-spot performances made each episode sound like something from podcasting's future. When Mission to Zyxx came to an end in 2022, the show's creators — Alden Ford, Jeremy Bent, Allie Kokesh, Seth Lind, Winston Noel, and Moujan Zolfaghari — needed a break and time to figure out what they wanted to do next. Eventually they landed on The Young Old Derf Chronicles; it's set in the same universe as Mission to Zyxx and features many voices from the original, but it's a very different kind of (mini)series, one that's lampooning something much more modern about sci-fi. When I recently sat down with Ford and Lind ahead of The Young Old Derf Chronicles ' debut at this year's Tribeca Film Festival, they told me that their new podcast is, in part, a response to the way that studios have become obsessed with expanding their established franchises with prequels. But The Young Old Derf Chronicles is also the creative team's way of showing fans how important their continued support has been. This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. Looking back, how has the Zyxx fandom evolved, would you say, and how has fan engagement impacted the show? Alden Ford: When we started in season 2, we started a Patreon to help fund some of the more ambitious aspects of the show and pay [sound designer] Shane [O'Connell] for the work that he was increasingly putting into every episode to make them bigger and crazier. That really connected us to our listeners in a way that I don't think we really would have expected in season 1 when it was just a show that was out there and people liked it. Seth Lind: Something that surprised us was just how deeply so many of the fans care about the show. When we set out to make it, we wanted it to be funny, we wanted people to like it, and we wanted it to be popular. But we didn't really dare to hope that it would become so important and meaningful to people. We heard from people saying, 'I was in the deepest depression of my life and this was the thing I would look forward to,' or 'My partner passed away and this is the first thing that made me laugh.' Right around the time the show was ending, a group of fans made us this thick book they called Mission to Zine that was a collection of art and letters saying what the show had meant to them. Things like that made us feel a responsibility to our fans. The show is violent and it can get very blue, but we always worked to protect its heart and make it feel like it was coming from a good place. If there was something that seemed like it was punching down, we'd cut it out, and while characters could be mean as individuals, but like the show as a whole couldn't. I think those instincts led to us cultivating a fandom that really cares for each other. And having that community made it so much more meaningful to make the show. AF: As fans of sci-fi, we all know very, very intimately how disappointing it can be when you're a fan of something that doesn't land the plane or gets canceled too soon. And so for us, once we got a few seasons in we got invested in making it as good as possible. Especially in the back half of season 5, we were like, 'What are the ways to wrap up this show so that everyone who listens and cares about it is going to be satisfied by it?' Of course, that's an impossible task because you're never going to do something that makes everybody happy. But I think we ended it on our own terms, which is more than a lot of shows can say. Why Derf? AF: There's a couple different reasons. The fun reason is that we all know how much Star Wars there is now. I'm not complaining, but I do think it has become its own kind of cliché that no character, no matter how silly or tertiary, deserves their own fully fledged miniseries where you explain every possible aspect of their backstory. You're not hype for a Glup Shitto series? AF: [ Laughs ] I mean, yes, I'm looking forward to the Salacious B. Crumb trilogy and the show chronicling Max Rebo's rise to stardom. But yeah, we thought that if we were going to do something else in the Zyxx universe, it'd be fun to do exactly the things Star Wars would do — something like an Obi-Wan, or a Mandalorian, or a Boba Fett series. Parodying the genre and the tropes around it felt very true to us generally. But the other reason is that Justin [Tyler] is a guy we all love and he's a fan favorite. SL: Derf is the closest thing to being the Obi-Wan of this universe, and just being able to call him 'Young Old Derf' completely sold me on the idea of doing a show about him. Because, like, that's so stupid, and 'the story of Derf when he was slightly less old' is a spinoff no one asked for. But I also remember Justin very early on in the first couple episodes, he gave Alden some feedback about the show, saying that, like, 'Pleck has to be important.' Especially in the early seasons, Pleck — who's the audience surrogate — was kind of a punching bag, and it was kind of a joke that he was important. But Justin was like, 'As silly as this all is, this guy actually has to be someone who ends up being significant and he has to have an arc to follow.' I think that really helped the show find its voice, and is a big part of what helped us last so many seasons. Did Andor inform your approach to crafting The Young Old Derf Chronicles? AF: One of the challenges we gave ourselves is making a new kind of show. Not that we wanted to reinvent the wheel or anything, but we wanted to make Derf distinctly different in substance and structure from the original show. With the new show, it's essentially a first-person narrative where pretty much everything is pretty being told from Derf's perspective. And from an improv standpoint, we approached it way less from the typical Zyxx format where we start on the ship, we get a mission, and then we're on the planet of the week. With Derf, we thought, what if we treated it more just like a 'fuck around' where we're just having fun with Derf in these new settings with a lot more walk-ons, digressions, and longer scenes where weirder stuff happens and we're not as worried about the propulsion of the plot or a strict three-act structure? It's been way harder to make and way harder to edit and produce, but it's really fulfilling for us especially because we're not just palette-swapping Mission to Zyxx. I don't know if Andor was trying to do that by mixing up the structure and the style, but I do think that's been the key for getting us creatively excited about making this thing. Would you be open to more Zyxx beyond The Young Old Derf Chronicles? AF: Absolutely. I think doing this show as a limited series has really felt like a good and sustainable way to keep things going. We've all talked about doing this new show, you know, seeing how listeners respond, and then reassessing our workload to see if doing more in the future makes sense with our lives now. If we continue to make shows in the Zyxx world, it will probably be in ways like this where we'll come up with something, we can produce 10 episodes, work for a year to actually make the thing, and then regroup to see what the next thing is. The Young Old Derf Chronicles does not yet have a firm release date. But if you're interested in seeing the Mission to Zyxx crew perform and produce an episode live, tickets are still available for their upcoming live show at Caveat in New York City, which will also be livestreamed. Featured Videos From The Verge Can a redesign save Apple's software? | The Vergecast It's a slowish news week ahead of some very busy news weeks, so of course Nilay and David start the show with a long discussion about party speakers. Eventually, they get into the news, beginning with some of the huge Apple redesigns planned for WWDC in June. For the first time in a long time, the stakes for Apple's software teams feel really high. After that, the hosts talk about Nilay's recent interview with Google CEO Sundar Pichai, and what the AI-ification of everything means for the future of the web. Finally, in the lightning round, it's time for another Brendan Carr is a Dummy, plus some talk about the Nintendo Switch 2, a bit of confusing tariff news, and more.
