The Brunch round-up: The week and how it made us feel

Karan Soni, who plays Deadpool’s desi taxi driver and associate in the movies, is winning in life. His queer romcom, A Nice Indian Boy, has debuted with 100% Rotten Tomatoes rating. Critics says it’s witty and refreshing. Some are even calling it the DDLJ for the men. Who’s a superhero now?

Most Enid Blyton fans might remember The Famous Five and The Secret Seven, perhaps even the Mallory Towers series. OG’s remember Brer Rabbit, Adventures of the Wishing-Chair, and the Faraway Tree series. Director Simon Farnaby is an OG, then. He’s adapting the first book of The Faraway Tree series, The Enchanted Wood, into a movie. Nicola Coughlan, Andrew Garfield, Claire Foy and Rebecca Ferguson are all starring. Hope it’s magic!

For the first time in history, no men have been nominated for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance, Best Pop Solo Performance, and Best Pop Vocal Album at the Grammys. It’s unlikely to happen again. So, enjoy it while it lasts. And everyone who loves pop, don’t put your hands in the air like you just don’t care. Because you do. Clap.

Season 2 of the animated adaptation of Arcane is killing it. This, after S1 became Netflix’s highest-rated series in 2021. The show, based on League of Legends, focuses on sisters Vi and Jinx caught in the conflict between cities Piltover and Zaun. Gamers have suffered cheesy adaptations (Angry Birds, Pokémon) and cheered great ones (Super Mario, Prince of Persia). Arcane and The Last of Us are in a league of their own.

We’re spending more on pets than ever before. China’s luxury market is tanking. Some clever marketer at Louis Vuitton decided to turn both developments into a single business opportunity with designer bags to carry doggos in. Don’t laugh. The bone-shaped LV is incredibly cute, for those who still have money left over from vet fees.

If you remember OK Go’s song Here It Goes again, how’s your back pain? The 2005 song featured the four band members doing an oddly arresting synchronised dance on a set of treadmills. Super-low-budget, sky-high-engagement, it won a Grammy Award for Best Music Video. OK Go recently released a cute throwback, with commentary on how they shot the video. BRB, knees hurting too.

Citadel: Honey Bunny takes off from the OG Citadel – that over-produced, over-acted, over-sold tale of spies. But this version is way sharper, with Samantha as an agent and filmmakers Raj & DK. She’s made for action, the tense scenes have a subtle undercurrent of humour (Varun Dhawan’s character complains, in the middle of a car chase, that his daughter doesn’t call him Papa). There’s hope for this universe yet.

We don’t have great, great grandparents. But our dating histories probably go back long enough that they seem like different eras. Thank the internet this week for a new term: Great, great boyfriend/great, great girlfriend. Just someone we were dating a long time ago, many partners removed. We just wish that great, great meant they were actually, you know, great.

Ahmedabad singer-songwriter Tshering Bhutia’s (@tsheruu) peppy, jazz pop debut single, Hair On My Legs, makes poetry out of the unglamorous subject of the title. The lyrics: “The hair on my legs don’t talk to me like you do, the hair on my legs don’t go sneezing when I tell em’ bout my flu. You better stop pointing fingers at the hair on my legs”. So funny and catchy, it’s the earworm of the season.

Hansal Mehta’s superpower is how well dramatises real-life stories. Aligarh (2015), was about a professor targeted for being gay. Faraaz (2022) was about a terror attack in Dhaka. Scam 1992 (2020) followed the rise and fall of stock broker Harshad Mehta. In The Buckingham Murders, however, reality bores, not bites. Predictable plot, cliché views of communal unrest, tired revenge tropes. Only Kareena shines. What went wrong?

How could you not? The black rain frog, found in South Africa’s Cape Fold Mountains, has a naturally downturned mouth that gives it a resting sad face. It’s also tiny – not more than 2cm long - and has skin that look like the peel of a ripe avocado. It can’t hop or swim, and its walk is more of a wobble. It won’t turn into a prince, but with a bio like that, he’s already a hit online.

Jeremy Allen White, our collective hot rodent boyfriend, reviver of Calvin Klein’s fortunes, hero to short kings everywhere, romanticiser of restaurant kitchens, is playing The Boss, musician Bruce Springsteen, in an upcoming movie. Images have leaked, of course, and White is wearing brown contacts. He looks... different. We love his baby blues. We’re not sure how we feel about baby brown.