Shutterstock

Whether your dog wasn’t able to bite the rump of a mailman running away or their favorite squeak toy stopped squeaking or they were thirsty and the toilet seat lid was down, pooches encounter stress no matter how much of a good boy they are. The stress of their human only remembering their birthday every seven years can take its toll on a doggo and even affect their sleep. A new study has found that dogs struggle to sleep after having a stressful day. Dogs, they’re just like us!

From the Independent:

Scientists in Hungary monitored the brain activity of 16 pet dogs, including Labradors, a Jack Russell and a sheepdog, over three hours. In one round of tests, the dogs were subjected to brief positive experiences like playing and petting, while the next was negative and involved being separated from their owner or stared at. The dogs were then allowed to go to a sleeping place. The researchers found the dogs tended to fall asleep more quickly after the negative experience, an apparently protective response to escape from their stressful feelings. Dogs that experienced negative treatment also spent more time in the REM stage of sleep, when the brain is more active, meaning less time in the deeper stages.

Who wouldn’t lose sleep when you don’t want to drop the tennis ball in your mouth, but you also want your human to throw the ball for you to fetch.

“However we found dogs get less deep sleep after a negative experience, said Dr. Anna Kis, of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. “It suggests that, just as humans have a bad night’s sleep after a difficult day, dogs may have a similar problem.”

Poor doggos, must be super stressful to have too many dog toys and never know which one to play with.

[Metro]

Clowns are so hot right now. Thanks to the overwhelming success of the movie It and the rash of people dressing like clowns to scare entire towns over the past few years. Despite their mascot being a king, Burger King has jumped on the clown phenomenon, but their new clown-based marketing manages to take a shot at their direct competition. Burger King trolled rival McDonald’s with a pretty unusual marketing campaign that also gives you free food.

Burger King is offering free Whoppers to anyone who wears a clown costume to their fast food locations this Halloween. There is a 90-second commercial for the promotion and the marketing slogan is “Come as a clown, eat like a king.” “We don’t usually talk about clowns,” said Alex Macedo, President of Burger King’s North American operations. “But for this Halloween, come dressed as a clown to eat like a king.”

The promotion is called “Scary Clown Night” and will only be available from 7 pm until they close on Halloween, Oct. 31. However, the offer is only valid for the first 500 clowns that waddle up to select Burger King restaurants in Boston, Miami, Los Angeles, Austin, and Salt Lake City.

However, as clever as this campaign is, it also has the chance to blow up in Burger King’s face. The outbreak of creepy clowns has been so overwhelming in some places that entire towns have outlawed people from wearing clown costumes. Earlier this year, a man was arrested for dressing up like the Joker and brandishing a sword. Not to mention that there is a healthy amount of the U.S. population that is absolutely petrified of clowns. Even professional clowns are upset over the movie It because they are seen as creepy, which they probably are. So that means that there will be hordes of evil-looking clowns swarming to Burger Kings across this great country, but they are only there to get free food. Meanwhile, everyone who is terrified by clowns and wants to pay for their food will be avoiding Burger King like the plague on Halloween. Congratulations Burger King, you just played yourself.

[BusinessInsider]

Chargers’ punt returner Travis Benjamin would probably like to have a do-over right about now. During the Chargers game on Sunday against the Patriots, Benjamin took back a punt and for whatever reason ran towards the end zone which resulted in a safety after he got tackled by several Patriots players

Rockstar

“When is Red Dead Redemption 2 coming out?” That’s the question that every fan of the popular Wild West video game has been asking since Rockstar Games announced the game in October 2016. It’s been over seven years since the original Red Dead Redemption was released on May 18, 2010, and 13 years since Red Dead Revolver came out on May 3, 2004. The release date of Red Dead Redemption 2 was delayed, but it is definitely coming to a console near you in the near future, but when?

Red Dead Redemption 2 originally had a release date of Fall 2017, but that was before delays pushed back the debut of the highly anticipated third-person shooter game. Rockstar Games understands that the expectations are sky-high for any title they release, especially Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead Redemption, so it makes sense to delay the game to ensure it is as perfect as it can be instead of rushing it out on the market.

Rockstar Games explained the reason for the delay in a post on their site. “Some extra time is necessary to ensure that we can deliver the best experience possible for our fans.” The video game publisher said. “We are very sorry for any disappointment this delay causes, but we are firm believers in delivering a game only when it is ready,” the statement from Rockstar read.

To make up for the delay, Rockstar Games provided new screenshots of the open-world video game to satiate the unquenchable appetites of gamers, which you can see below as well as the trailers for the game. The latest news is that Red Dead Redemption 2 is coming out in Spring 2018. That is a pretty large window, since Spring 2018 begins on Tuesday, March 20 and ends on Thursday, June 21. Polygon reported that Red Dead Redemption 2 will launch sometime after April 1, 2018.

As far as the game, Rockstar had this to say about Red Dead Redemption 2, “This outlaw epic set across the vast and unforgiving American heartland will be the first Rockstar game created from the ground up for the latest generation of console hardware.” RDR2 is a prequel to Red Dead Redemption that takes place in the Old West set in the 1800s. Expect shanty towns, saloons, bustling general stores, and shootouts in the dusty streets as well as dealing with the harsh habitat of deserts, mountains and the Great Plains. The main character and protagonist of RDR2 is Arthur Morgan, an outlaw affiliated with the Dutch van der Linde gang. Based on the two trailers (seen below), Morgan will be traversing the Wild West engaging in gunfights with bandits, herding cattle, and collected money from people who probably don’t want to pay at all costs. Joining Morgan are seven characters (a la The Magnificent 7), which will probably be integral in both single and multiplayer game modes.

Rockstar’s glorious western adventure will be available on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Unfortunately, it does not sound like Red Dead Redemption 2 will be made for older generation consoles such as PS3 and Xbox 360.

Here are the Red Dead Redemption 2 trailers that have been released thus far.

Here are the Red Dead Redemption 2 screenshots that have been released thus far.

Via Rockstar Games

Via Rockstar Games

Via Rockstar Games

Via Rockstar Games

Via Rockstar Games

Via Rockstar Games

In the third quarter of today’s Bears-Saints game, Bears tight end Zach Miller went to make a catch in the end zone when his leg snapped in half. Despite the injury, Miller held on to the ball but for whatever reason refs didn’t feel he had possession for long enough

You can watch the video here and here.
People were obviously pissed with the call.

Last week, Cincinnati Bengals running back Joe Mixon told reporters that he believes he could’ve done “way more than [Le’Veon Bell] did” if only he had as many touches as the Pittsburgh Steelers running back LeVeon Bell.

“Me personally, I feel like I can do way more than [Bell] did,” Mixon said Monday, per Katherine Terrell of ESPN.com. “Like I said, I only had seven carries. I can’t showcase nothing if I don’t get the ball. There’s nothing else I can say.”

This obviously pissed Bell who took to Twitter to fire back at Mixon

On Friday it was revealed that Texans owner Bob McNair referred to NFL players as “inmates running the prison’ to group of owners during a meeting last week.

We can’t have the inmates running the prison,” McNair reportedly said, referring to NFL players.

The meeting took place last week in New York, one day after a small group of owners met with a handful of players about ongoing protests during the national anthem.

NFL executive Troy Vincent, a former player, later stood up and said he was offended by McNair’s comment, according to ESPN.

After the owners finished, Troy Vincent stood up. He was offended by McNair’s characterization of the players as “inmates.” Vincent said that in all his years of playing in the NFL — during which, he said, he had been called every name in the book, including the N-word — he never felt like an “inmate.”

McNair apologized for his coomments but players didn’t feel it was genuine and planned to protest before their game against the Seahawks.

It seems like the players lived up to their promise because nearly every Texans players knelt during the anthem before today’s game/

Getty Image

Megatron back? According to a bombshell report this morning by ESPN’s Adam Schefter several teams have expressed interested in trading for the rights of retired wide receiver Calvin Johnson before Tuesday’s NFL trade deadline.

As it turns out, one of the teams that are reportedly interested Johnson’s services are the Philadelphia Eagles.

Before the season started Johnson expressed interest in returning to league if the Lions traded away his rights but we’ll see if it can actually happen.

We have an early contender for best sports costume for the year.

Today, Reddit poster easycheesay uploaded a pic of his friend who he described as having lost his leg to cancer dressing up as Gordon Hayward, the Boston Celtic forward who suffered a horrific ankle injury in his first game as a Celtic.

Via Reddit.

While some will say it’s too soon for Gordon Hayward jokes, this one is actually pretty clever.

The Pittsburgh Steelers as a team have had several notable celebrations this season but they may have topped themselves tonight. Watch as the Steelers bust out an amazing bench press celebration following a LeVeon Bell touchdown in the second quarter.

Amazing.

Via Apollo

You’ve never seen a vehicle quite like the Apollo Intensa Emozione because there’s never been a vehicle quite like the Apollo Intensa Emozione. You may see subtle similarities to a Lamborghini or a Ferrari or a McLaren or a Formula One racing car or the Batmobile or even a jet fighter, but this hypercar is truly one-of-a-kind. The lines and angles are absolutely ridiculous and the design is something to behold. But the Intensa Emozione (which means “intense emotion” in Italian) is not just a mind-bending chassis, the engine on this supercar will make the ground thunder.

The Apollo IE is powered by a 6.3-liter V12 engine that produces an ungodly 780-horsepower with 9,000 rpm and 760 Nm of torque. There are no turbos, superchargers or hybrid systems. The supercar features three engine Map-modes that the driver selects and they are: Wet, Sport, Track. Traction control can be turned completely off.

The radical body type features a narrow teardrop-shaped cockpit. Apollo’s IE is an all-carbon-fiber chassis that allows the supercar to weigh just 2,756 pounds. That lightweight chassis and the fearsome engine equals some impressive performance. The IE jets from 0 to 60 mph in a neck-snapping 2.7 seconds and the top speed is 208 mph. And those over-the-top spoilers aren’t just for show, they produce approximately 3,000 pounds of downforce at 186 mph, meaning supreme handling and cornering.

“We felt that all the technological advancement and automation in today’s supercars took away the pure, raw emotional connection between driver and car,” said Apollo Chairman Norman Choi. “We wanted to build a car that would fill that void separating car and driver. so we built the Apollo IE.”

If you’re looking to purchase an Apollo Intensa Emozione you had better act fast and you had better have a fat bank account. Apollo, a German company, will only manufacture 10 of these supercars with the exorbitant price tag of $2.3 million.

Via Apollo

Via Apollo

Via Apollo

Via Apollo

Via Apollo

Via Apollo

Via Apollo

[TopGear]

To all the guido and guidettes, if you are a fan of Jersey Shore then you’ll be excited for what happened this weekend. Deena Nicole Cortese got married and a Jersey Shore reunion went down at her wedding, except for one cast member. On Saturday, Deena married Christopher Buckner at Laurita Winery in New Egypt, New Jersey. All your favorite meatballs and meatheads from the hit MTV reality show were in attendance except for Ronnie Magro.

Five years after Jersey Shore went off the air, Nicole “Snooki” Polizzi, Jenny “JWoww” Farley, Sammi “Sweetheart” Giancola, DJ Pauly D, Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino, and Vinny Guadagnino were all at the wedding to witness Deena officially retire from being single and raise her smush jersey into the rafters. The cast members, minus Ronnie, posted photos from the joyous nuptials. “Crew back together for Deena’s Wedding! I LOVE YOU MAMA MEATBALL!!! @deenanicolemtv,” Snooki wrote on Instagram.

Now you know why there was a national shortage of hair gel this week.

This comes months after there was another Jersey Shore reunion over the summer, which also did not include Ronnie.

Ronnie claimed that he wasn’t able to attend Deena’s wedding because of “business.” “I’m not going to make it to Deena’s wedding. I’m actually in the middle of a project, a business investment so I have to be out here in California. She knows that I wish her the best. Her and Chris, you know, they’re a great couple and I’m always rooting for them and I’m happy that she found someone to spend the rest of her life with,” Ronnie told Toofab.

Maybe a wedding without Ron Ron Juice and the constant bickering between Ronnie and Sammie Sweetheart is a better wedding.

The story of JuJu Smith-Schuster and his stolen bike was one of the biggest non-football stories of the NFL this week.

While JuJu’s bike was eventually returned the Steelers wide receiver has been non-stop joking about the incident. Tonight, after he scored on a 97-yard touchdown on Sunday Night Football against the Lions, Smith-Schuster hilariously celebrated by making sure no one could steal the stationary bike on the sidelines by locking it up.

JuJu might have become my favorite player this season.

Editor’s Note: Welcome to a daily column we run here at BroBible breaking down the day’s biggest stories in sports finance with commentary from the equities analyst and sports fanatic perspectives. It comes to us via our friends at JohnWallStreet, publisher of a free e-mail newsletter focused on sports related public equities and their subsidiaries. You can sign up here.

MLS Becomes 1st U.S. League to Publicly Support Legalized Gambling

The NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL & NCAA all publicly oppose New Jersey’s pursuit to legalize sports gambling in the state, but MLS Commissioner Don Garber went on record at the recent Yahoo! Finance All Markets Summit supporting Governor Chris Christie’s efforts. Garber sees an opportunity for MLS to pave the way in supporting change to gambling laws, as his league doesn’t face the same public scrutiny those opposing New Jersey’s stance. The Commissioner noted how gambling is a part of the sport’s “DNA”, referencing in-stadium betting within the English Premier League; and explained how much revenue (an estimated $150 billion/year gambled illegally) would be generated, if gambling were to be legalized and taxed.

Howie Long-Short: There is a prevailing feeling that that the SCOTUS is going to declare that the federal government cannot prohibit states from authorizing legalized sports gambling. If that happens, established gaming sites/apps are going to have a huge lead on the abundance of competition looking to enter the space. The Stars Group (TSG) would be among the companies in the position to benefit. The Poker Stars parent company, which generated $305 million in total Q2 revenue (+ 6.8% YOY) and recently launched Poker Stars Power Up (a poker/video game hybrid), could easily expand their sports book and enter the U.S. market.

Fan Marino: Point spreads and the over/under not your thing? Try prop bets! Paddy Power (PDYPY) is offering odds on the city that will land Amazon’s (AMZN) $5 billion HQ2; with Atlanta, the front-runner at 2-1. Austin (3-1) and Boston (6-1) have the 2^nd and 3^rd best odds among the 238 cities that submitted bids. Unfortunately, Paddy Power does not accept bets from U.S. residents.

Nets Owner Sells 49% of Franchise at $2.3 Billion Valuation

Brooklyn Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov has agreed to sell 49% of the NBA franchise to Alibaba (BABA) co-founder, Joseph Tsai; with Tsai receiving the option to purchase controlling interest in the franchise in 2021. Prokhorov will remain the operating owner for the next 4 years, while Tsai will not maintain any role on the business or basketball side of the franchise during that time. The deal does not include the Barclays Center, which has an estimated value of $1 billion.

Howie Long-Short: Tsai acquired the Nets at a $2.3 billion valuation, eclipsing the NBA record $2.2 billion that Tilman Fertitta paid for the Houston Rockets. The Nets lost $23.5 million last season (2^nd most in NBA, beyond only Detroit), while generating a league lows from its local TV contact. There is simply no way the Nets are worth $2.3 billion. The last NFL team sold was Buffalo, for $1.4 billion in 2014. The NFL generated around $11 billion in revenue during the 2014 season. The NBA generated roughly $8 billion last year. How could NBA teams be worth over a billion dollars more, when the league generates less revenue and pays out a higher percentage to their players?

Fan Marino: Sports fans want 3 things from the owner of their favorite team; a passion to win, a willingness to spend and to stay out of player personnel decisions. Based on that criteria, Prokhorov has been a tremendous owner for the Nets. As a Nets fan though, I’ll never forgive him for hiring Billy King, signing off on one of the worst deals in professional sports history and moving the franchise from New Jersey.

Note: The summary for this story was written by our friends at The Water Coolest. Check out TheWaterCoolest.com for the latest market news and professional advice.

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Pitino Files Suit Against Adidas, Claims Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress

Former Louisville basketball coach Rick Pitino has filed a lawsuit against Adidas (ADDYY) claiming payments made by the company to elite high school players, that led to his termination at the school, ultimately damaged his reputation. Pitino has filed on grounds of “intentional infliction of emotional distress”, firmly stating that he had no knowledge of any payments made to recruits. The FBI believes otherwise. In findings released last month, it’s alleged ADDYY had $100,000 funneled to prized recruit Brian Bowen on the school’s behalf; with Pitino directly calling ADDYY Head of Global Sports Marketing, Jim Gatto, for the bribe money.

Howie Long-Short: Pitino’s complaint against ADDYY states “this lawsuit is about more than just money; it is Coach Pitino’s vehicle for proving that he had nothing to do with Adidas’ outrageous, wrongful, and illegal conspiracy.” Who is he kidding? As the influential journalist/cultural critic H.L. Meckem once said “when somebody says it’s not about the money, it’s about the money.”  If Pitino can prove that he had “no part — active, passive, or through willful ignorance”, he’ll be able to argue Louisville fired him without just cause; ensuring his legal right to the $44 million remaining on his contract.

Fan Marino: Deadspin writer Patrick Hruby wrote an article arguing that Bowen was a bargain at $100K and that his intrinsic value is upwards of $1.72 million. Don’t buy it. A player would have to be a Top 17 NBA draft pick coming out of high school (which isn’t even permitted) to earn that much money. Terrance Ferguson was a 2015 McDonalds All-American, who committed to Arizona. He instead chose to play overseas, earning roughly $1 million in Australia during the ’16 season. He was selected with the 21^st pick in the 2017 NBA draft. He will earn $1.487 million this season. You can argue a college scholarship isn’t fair compensation for the biggest of collegiate stars, but to suggest they should be paid $700K more than they could receive anywhere else in the world is absurd.

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JohnWallStreet is not a person or location, but a destination for the educated sports fan.

While we won’t be publishing “hot takes” on LeBron’s relative greatness to Jordan, we will be offering up the most relevant sports related finance news, in easily digestible bites, with commentary from both the equities analyst and sports fanatic perspectives.

We’ll cover publicly traded professional teams & stadiums, television networks, apparel & footwear companies, equipment companies, ticketing companies, content and facilities providers. If it trades on Wall Street, and has a sports angle, it’s in our wheel house.

Howie Long-Short and Fan Marino will be providing their expert opinions on each story. They have slightly different areas of expertise. Fan Marino is a firm believer that the SEC is the premier football conference. Howie Long-Short knows it as the Security & Exchange Commission. Fan Marino lives and dies with the college selection of 5 star, blue chip recruits. Howie Long-Short spends his days analyzing blue chip stocks. Howie Long-Short knows that Black Monday occurred on October 19th, 1987. Fan Marino swears it happens every January after Week 17. You get the point.

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You never keep home run balls from the opposing team but this guy’s girlfriend didn’t know that. Watch as the dude sitting next to couple steal’s Yasiel Puig’s home run ball from his buddy’s girlfriend to throw it back on the field.

She looks so confused. Amazing.

Did you spend the entire weekend binging on Stranger Things 2? Congrats. Some of us have lives to live and can’t spend all weekend on the couch so zip the lip on any spoilers until at least Friday.

In the meantime, spoil your inner fanboy with some Stranger Things wall art for your place. These posters are cool enough to hang in a grown man’s apartment or office without making people wonder about what he does in his spare time.

Here are five wall art options that show you’re a true fan and over the age of 12.

‘Stranger Things’ Original Wall Art – Gloss Poster Print [$29.95]
‘Stranger Things’ Eleven Poster – [$18.49]
Stranger Things/Gorillaz Mash-up – [$40]
The Upside Down ‘Stranger Things’ Poster – [$7]
‘Stranger Things’ Retro Poster – [$13.99]

MORE

The BroBible team writes about gear that we think you want. Occasionally, we write about items that are a part of one of our affiliate partnerships and we will get a percentage of the revenue from sales.

CNBC

Steve Wozniak was a co-founder of Apple back in the 1970’s when he and Steve Jobs built the first Apple computer prototype out of Jobs’ garage. He’s been an integral figure in Silicon Valley for decades, and he’s credited with being the sole inventor on 4 of Apple’s most prominent patents.

Throughout his career, Wozniak has made a literal fortune off of Apple’s success so you’d think he’d choose his words more carefully when discussing why he won’t be upgrading the to iPhone X immediately. Instead of saying, “I’m a creature of habit and I love my current iPhone” the Woz likened the iPhone X as being the same phone to its predecessors in a segment with CNBC:

Steve Wozniak, aka The Woz, left Apple in the 80’s after experiencing a life-altering plane crash which caused him to suffer from retrograde amnesia. That’s not at all integral to this story, I just find it interesting that one of the men who changed Silicon Valley as we know it was able to walk away from his (then current) career after a plane crash.

“I don’t think any of my upgrades over time have been that big a jump”…He’s right. Since the first iPhone hit the market there really hasn’t been leaps and bounds forward. Apple could drop a game-changing smartphone if they really wanted to but it appears as if they sit on existing technology so that they can methodically release that tech in upcoming models of the phone. This forces customers into minor upgrades each year that the customers are willing to spend $$$$ on. Unless you’re willing to wait for 3-5 editions of the phone before upgrading you are not going to see a massive change in your life, and Steve Wozniak just acknowledged that.

[via CNCBC]

Shutterstock

Anyone who drinks knows that once you’ve had a cocktail or two suddenly many things in life that are difficult suddenly don’t seem to be nearly so hard anymore.

That backflip you’ve never been able to complete? Hold my beer. Asking out that girl in payroll that you’ve been afraid to approach for fear of being shot down? Be right back. Speaking a foreign language more fluently than ever. Hells ya!

No, seriously, that last one is actually true, at least according to a new study that I 100% believe.

Reports The Huffington Post…

A small study published last week in the Journal of Psychopharmacology shows that a small amount of alcohol can help people speak a foreign language better. Researchers found that imbibing helped people speak a non-native language more fluently, even when they didn’t think they were doing that well.

The study’s authors observed 50 native German speakers who were attending a university in the Netherlands, where classes were taught in Dutch. Each person in the study indicated that they drank alcohol on occasion. The participants had also recently passed a Dutch proficiency test.

Each volunteer was asked to engage in a two-minute recorded conversation with an interviewer in Dutch. Half of the volunteers were given alcohol before the chat, and the other half were given water. The amount of alcohol varied depending on the person’s body type. (For example, a 150-pound man was given slightly under a pint’s worth of beer.)

Then two native Dutch speakers, who weren’t told which participants had imbibed a little alcohol and which ones didn’t, listened to the conversations and ranked the participants using metrics such as vocabulary and grammar.

Guess which group rated higher? You got it, the ones who drank. Aww yeah! Who needs Rosetta Stone now?!

However…

Researchers theorize that drinking too much can have the opposite effect, making proficiency in another language worse due to slurred words.

That’s probably a pretty solid theory.

Netflix

It should be pretty obvious, but there are some potential SPOILERS ahead for Stranger Things Season 2. If you haven’t watched through Episode 7 then you might want to peace out now. Moving on….There was an episode in Stranger Things Season 2 that had everyone scratching their heads. I’m talking about Episode 7, ‘The Lost Sister’, where Eleven/Jane goes off to Chicago to reconnect with her ‘sister’. This girl, Kali, was tattooed with #8 and also possesses otherworldly powers like Eleven. Their skill set differs, however, and Kali’s abilities enable her to make people see things that are not there.

Netflix

In ‘The Lost Sister’, Eleven reconnects with Kali after finding her living in a dilapidated warehouse in Chicago. The girl’s become a criminal and lives with a group of criminals. Their gang tracks down ‘bad people’ and kills them. Eleven goes out on one of these outings after tracking down the man responsible for scrambling her mother’s brain with electroshock therapy but Eleven calls off the killing after finding out the man has two daughters.

‘The Lost Sister’ Kali is angry with Eleven for the change of heart but ultimately seems to forgive her. Which is fine. They’ve both been through some serious shit and carry insane amounts of baggage. But what the shit was the point of that entire episode? The Duffer Brothers, co-creators of Stranger Things, explained the purpose of the episode in an interview with EW:

“Whether it works for people or not, it allows us to experiment a little bit. It’s important for Ross and I to try stuff and not feel like we’re doing the same thing over and over again. It’s almost like doing a whole little other pilot episode in the middle of your season… But it was really fun to write and cast and work on. Our test of the episode was we tried to pull it out of the show just to make sure that we needed it because I didn’t want it in there as filler — even though some critics are accusing us of doing that. But Eleven’s journey kind of fell apart, like the ending didn’t work, without it. So I was like, whether this works or not, we need this building block in here or the whole show is going to collapse. It’s not going to end well.” (via)

As noted on UPROXX, Ross Duffer compared Eleven’s journey and return to Luke Skywalker in The Empire Strikes Back. To be fair, the hero’s journey is one of the oldest archetypes in storytelling so I’m not seeing the connection to Star Wars specifically, but I don’t want to get caught up in that.

I think I was about 15 minutes into that episode before I looked to the person next to me and said ‘what the fuck is the point of this episode?’ If it was all about Eleven leaving town on a journey to experience some revelations and gain life experience then that’s fine. I’ll take that. But if this was the writer’s way of saying ‘we’re going to move away from the plot of this show because we don’t have enough material to write 9 episodes in a row’ then I think I’m going to have to abandon this show in the future. I’m 100% certain we’ll see Kali/#8 again in Season 3 or 4, but if they plan on introducing #’s 1-7, 9, and 10 and it’s just a show about people with powers and the core characters are abandoned then I’m out.

Now that we’re all done binge-watching Stranger Things Season 2, can we unanimously agree that Steve is the best bro in the state of Indiana?

[h/t UPROXX]

The Chinese black market loves nothing more than stealing American products and selling them for cheap. This is an extraordinarily easy task for Chinese manufacturers to pull off because more often than not these products are already being manufactured in China.

Here, we see YouTube vlogger Collin Abroadcast going to a fake Yeezy store in China. Coincidentally, Kanye West’s Yeezy Boosts are manufactured in China. Kanye’s even discussed visiting China to involve himself directly in the design process…Which, to be honest, I don’t see how someone can say they’ve designed a shoe when they’re not responsible for overseeing every aspect of it but then again I’ve never designed a shoe so I’m not one to judge here.

Anyways, this vlogger stumbled into a fake Yeezy store in China and it’s so, SO BAD that it’s almost amazing. What I don’t fully understand is if people are buying those shoes knowing that they’re fake, or if people in China think these are 100% legit? If they’re paying hundreds of dollars for well-manufactured knockoffs that are unique, that’s fine. But, if they think those are 100% legit Yeezy’s then there’s a serious problem here because people are getting ripped off. What do you bros think, are people buying these shoes thinking they’re real?