Into It: A Vulture Podcast with Sam Sanders

At the end of Britney Spears’s conservatorship in November of 2021, most of her fans rejoiced. But conspiracy theories have a subset of #FreeBritney fans convinced she’s still not really free. They focus on what they see as oddities or glitches in some of her Instagram posts. Vox reporter Rebecca Jennings says there are even theories that Britney has been replaced with AI or a body double. Rebecca...

What is up right now with country music and race? There’s the controversy over Jason Aldean’s “Try That in a Small Town,” Morgan Wallen topping the charts despite previously being canceled for saying the n-word, and Luke Combs’ country cover of Tracy Chapman’s Fast Car – which is doing better than the original. Sam talks with writer, sociologist, and country fan Tressie McMillan Cottom. Tressie un...

Bravo replaced the whole cast for the 14th season of The Real Housewives of New York City, but it almost doesn’t matter. “It’s about the franchise,” says Brian Moylan, who writes Vulture’s Housewives Institute Bulletin. There are, however, a handful of housewives that have had a lasting impact. A Housewives Mount Rushmore, if you will. Brian tells Sam why Teresa Giudice, Bethenny Frankel, NeNe Lea...

It's Barbenheimer weekend and Sam is joined by none other than Who? Weekly hosts Bobby Finger and Lindsey Weber for our own doubleheader — of games. First, we break down the long list of Barbie merch collabs from Burger King to Progressive to Uno. Then, we discuss ABC's The Golden Bachelor and why it's never too late for love; social media influencers joining the Hollywood strikes; and the confusi...

Barbie (the doll) is more than 60 years old. But Barbie (the idea, the aesthetic, the cultural artifact) feels more current than ever. And yes, the highly anticipated Barbie movie is definitely a big part of that, but Barbiecore has been around way before the film was even a sparkle in Greta Gerwig's eye. Sam chats with The Cut's Danya Issawi about her first Barbie memories and the inescapable way...

It’s been more than 60 years since both the Writers Guild and the Screen Actors Guild have gone on strike at the same time. Sam chats with Bloomberg’s Lucas Shaw about what the actors want and what the walkout will mean for Hollywood in the coming weeks and months. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

That recent scene in The Idol, the one where the intimacy coordinator gets locked in a bathroom, was fully unrealistic. So what does an intimacy coordinator do? They choreograph intimacy scenes and help filmmakers not get canceled. What do they work on besides sex? Well anything involving nudity, including bodily functions and medical procedures. What do they bring to a set? Mints, strapless under...

We're about halfway into 2023... but are we into it? Sam and Jay Jurden, comedian and writer on The Problem with Jon Stewart, take stock of the year thus far in pop culture: messy celebrity breakups, songs of the summer, the expanding cinematic universe of Mattel toys and dolls, the fall of Twitter, and more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What better way to celebrate our nation's independence than with an episode about Miss Americana herself? We revisit our episode about Taylor Swift from the eve of her Midnights album release. What is the meaning of Taylor Swift? She's performed damsel in distress, but represents women's empowerment. She's a confessional artist, but is careful about how much she reveals. She's an adult, but is oft...

What led podcaster and Spotify executive Bill Simmons to call Prince Harry and Meghan Markle "grifters" following the news that Spotify wouldn't continue its reportedly $20 million deal with the couple? Sam asks Vulture critics Kathryn VanArendonk and Nicholas Quah whether the era of huge celebrity content deals is over. We also get into the improbably good second season of FX's The Bear and why i...

Content creator and head of the Beyhive Kalen Allen is more than OK spending four thousand dollars on one ticket for Beyoncé’s Renaissance tour. 2023 feels like a big year for huge stadium tours for artists like Beyoncé, Taylor Swift, Bruce Springsteen, Ed Sheeran and more. But why are tickets so expensive, and how much are fans willing to put up with in order to go? Sam talks with music journalis...

Samantha Irby knows what you think about the newer characters on ‘And Just Like That.’ She writes for the ‘Sex and the City’ reboot, which addressed critiques of the original series’ whiteness by introducing new, non-white friends. Reactions were mixed over how well they pulled it off the first season, and people especially hated the over-the-top character of Che Diaz. Sam Irby insists the writers...

Sometimes before we have the language to describe ourselves, we have the culture in front of us to help — the movies, TV shows, and music we listened to and watched that's had a lasting impact. In honor of Pride Month, we ask three creatives about the culture that made them queer: writer, actor, and producer Lena Waithe; Tony Award-winning actor and singer Alex Newell; and writer and comedian Guy...

The Flash is giving DC Comics its own multiverse, but its star is giving... controversy. Ezra Miller was once considered The Next Big Thing in Hollywood, but after a string of arrests and destructive behavior... where does that leave us? More importantly: Do we really need more superhero multiverses? And we chat about whether the best approach to HBO's The Idol is hate-watching it, and the mess of...

Netflix broke the TV mold in 2013 with ‘House of Cards.’ Now, the streaming wars may have broken TV altogether. There’s so much stuff, a lot isn’t good, it’s confusing to find, sometimes disappears entirely, and, as the writers on strike will tell you, people making it aren’t getting paid the same as they once were. Vulture’s Josef Adalian tells Sam about how the race to compete with Netflix destr...

This week, Sam is joined by Lovett or Leave It host and Crooked Media co-founder Jon Lovett to get into the week of culture: Taylor Swift's breakup with Matt Healy, Apple's dip into augmented reality with its Vision Pro, and the latest in the wild animal x drug movie collaboration space Crackcoon. We also hear about the culture that's haunting us: Vanderpump Rules' Tom Sandoval has single-handedly...

‘Across the Spider-Verse’ was an animated feast, but many live-action, CGI-bloated summer blockbusters are visual mush. If you’re tired of lackluster computer-generated special effects, guess what? So are the artists who make them. They’re tired from long shifts and working paycheck to paycheck. VFX workers are some of the few Hollywood creatives who aren’t unionized, and they're scared to speak o...

This week, Today, Explained co-host Sean Rameswaram keeps our host chair warm while Sam is away. He's joined by Vulture TV critic Kathryn VanArendonk to figure out what kind of show Succession really was, whom it was for, and what to watch to fill the Succession-size hole in your heart. We also ask if Kathryn is into Ted Lasso ending, the return of the flip phone, and more. And we hear about the c...

Christy Carlson Romano was ubiquitous on the Disney Channel in the early 2000s, starring in ‘Even Stevens,’ ‘Kim Possible,’ and ‘Cadet Kelly.’  But after the roles stopped and the checks dried up, she lost money to psychics, struggled with family relationships, and grappled with addiction. Now she processes those experiences on her popular YouTube channel, with videos like “Why I Don't Talk to Shi...

This week, Sam is joined by comedian Zach Zimmerman. We catch up on the writers' strike and ask for his opinions on the series finale of HBO's Succession, the streaming service formerly known as HBO Max (it's just Max now, thanks), standing ovations at the Cannes Film Festival, and more. We also chat about Zach's new book Is It Hot in Here (Or Am I Suffering for All Eternity for the Sins I Committ...

Halle Bailey stars as Ariel in the live-action remake of the classic Disney animated film. Casting a Black actress in the role caused quite a splash — which inspired us to look back at two of Disney’s forays into Black princess movies.  Dr. Aria Halliday studies cultural constructions of Black girlhood and womanhood at The University of Kentucky. She and Sam break down the 1997 made for TV ‘Cinder...

This week, Sam is joined by comedian and writer Samantha Irby to dive into the week in culture: the latest movie in the Fast and the Furious franchise, Martha Stewart's historic Sports Illustrated cover, and Love Island-inspired British accents. We also chat about her newest book of essays Quietly Hostile and why she'd no longer want a TV show about her life. Exhibit A: her experience writing for...

AI is making fake Drake/The Weeknd songs, weird images, and there’s a worry that TV and movie scripts could be written by ChatGPT. But it’s also about to dramatically change the way we consume, share, and obsess over pop culture. Nilay Patel, Editor-in-Chief of The Verge, explains to Sam how pretty much everything we search on the internet is mediated by Google… and how AI is about to disrupt it a...

This week, Sam is joined by Into It's own Travis Larchuk and Tarkor Zehn. They try to convince Sam of the things they're into: The new Legend of Zelda game is worth your time (and money) and the Tarte makeup controversy actually has meaningful implications. Then we flip the game back around and ask for their thoughts on the end of MTV News, Tucker Carlson moving to Twitter, and more. We also hear...

As tech companies assure us AI is here to help and not to eradicate humanity, the Peacock series ‘Mrs. Davis’ explores what happens in a world where AI really does deliver on that promise. Executive producers Tara Hernandez and Damon Lindelof join Sam to talk about how they combined science fiction and Christianity in a show about a technophobic nun who is literally married to Jesus. Plus, Lindelo...