Cool

Back to Light is a creatively scientific series by photographer Caleb Charland that explores the naturally electrifying power of ordinary objects like fruits and loose change. The images in the series features a number of materials, including consumables readily found in one's pantry, generating enough power to light lamps and LED lights. We had previously seen Charland light a lamp with 300 apples, but now the grocery list has expanded to include oranges, lemons, limes, grapefruits, pomelos, and vinegar.

9 Film Frames is a single topic blog on Tumblr that presents the entirety of a movie in nine panels. The frames include anything from key plot points to popular scenes that have gone on to leave their mark in film history. The blog is an ongoing project that includes a wide variety of films from Orson Welles' classic Citizen Kane and blockbusters like The Dark Knight and Inception to the more obscure and indie films like Melancholia and Memento, as well as David Lynch's cult classic Mulholland Drive.

Today's your last chance to see this giant red balloon dog! As part of art fair Frieze New York, Paul McCarthy created this inflatable dog towering over Frieze's tent. At 80 feet tall, it's an interesting nod to Jeff Koons with one critic saying, "I’m not even sure why McCarthy bothered to make the giant balloon dog after Koons had already made his over-sized chrome ones, unless of course McCarthy is making a wry contemporary-art-historical commentary on Koons’ art, but that seems too precious and cerebral. Koons’ dogs were interesting, a tad, because of the change in material, so that what at first looked like a helium filled balloon was actually heavy, and hard as steel. McCarthy returned the dog to its balloon form, but just made it into the Gulliver of all dog balloons."

At long last, we have the hotly anticipated trailer for Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity. Aside from it being Cuarón’s first feature since 2006′s Children of Men, it reportedly has a 20-minute opening shot and while it was once set to star Robert Downey Jr. and Angelina Jolie, the parts ended up going to George Clooney and Sandra Bullock. I mean, that’s cool too, I guess. (*kicks can*). Finally, a use of Futura font that actually makes sense! Needless to say, Cuarón? In space? Oh, I’ll play your game, you rogue. But with big box office stars like George Clooney and Sandra Bullock on the bill, I’m a little surprised they went with the one-name, indie sci-fi name a lá Solaris or Moon and not something more commercial. Say, “Way Up in the Air,” or “The Blind Side of the Moon.” Yes, I’m a marketing genius. (*puts on foam cowboy hat marked “GENIUS,” pets cat*) “That debris’s changin’ yer lahfe…”

There are better movies than Space Jam. Lots of them. Hell, there are better movies within the genre of 90s kids' sports films (The Sandlot, definitely; Little Big League, probably; the first two Mighty Ducks movies, maybe). But that does not change the fact that I love Space Jam like a loyal family pet, and that I will always stop to watch it -- picking it up at any point -- any time I see it pop up on cable. And so, please allow me to take this opportunity to explain to you why I love it. You know what? I should do this as a list. People love lists. Especially when you're talking about something from the 90s. Yeah, let's do a list. FIVE THINGS I LOVE ABOUT SPACE JAM

When we last checked in on World’s Whitest Person Gwyneth Paltrow, she was dispensing her secrets for a successful relationship (more blowjobs, less arguing) in between getting a colonic and lecturing her gardener, Juan, on how juice cleanses and summers spent in chalets in the Swiss Alps are good for the complexion. And as you may have heard, when she’s not making the world a better place with her farts, Gwyneth has a website called Goop, where she teaches people how to be better at being white, or something, and apparently sells exceedingly white people things. For instance, the woman married to the Coldplay guy is currently selling stuff for your home bar on her site, stuff described on Goop as “unique accessories for the well-stocked bar.” Let’s sample the goods, shall we?

When he’s not busy chaperoning a floral sofa ’round town, Kanye West occasionally makes music. In fact, rumor has it that his much-anticipated follow-up to My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy will drop this year, and last night, we heard our first listen to the record, courtesy of recent G.O.O.D. Music signee Hudson Mohawke. Should we name it Album of the Year now, or wait until we hear the Daft Punk collaboration?

Gallon smashing is the Dumb & Dumberer of pranks. For the blissfully uninformed, “gallon smashing” is when…and please pay attention because this is very confusing…you grab a gallon of milk, water, any liquid but Surge really (the world needs its precious Surge) and you smash it. It’s pointless, unfunny, and *raises fists at teens*. The only good “gallon smashing” videos are those featuring people getting hurt, making the clip below, via Gawker, the Dumb & Dumber of “gallon smashing” videos. (Will you stop saying “gallon smashing”? Yes.)

Last year, Burnsy wrote about the lovely troll known as “Skinny Gurl” who called Kate Upton a cannibal for eating at Carls Jr. Kate Upton’s a cow, you see. Get it? She’s fat. Kate Upton is fat. The same Kate Upton you see above, that very Kate Upton, is fat. I wonder if “Skinny Gurl” knows “Gag of Thrones.” Anyway, Upton is on next month’s cover of Vogue, and in the issue, she discussed the reaction she received from the Skinny Gurls of the world after appearing in the second most popular Sports Illustrated ever, trailing only this classic.

A lot’s happened in TV this week. Dozens of network shows have been renewed, canceled, picked up, or generally ignored — it’s all very confusing to follow, and just as infuriating to try to make sense of. We covered the Big Four decisions on Happy Endings, Community, and Mulaney last night, but to keep things straight, I’ve put together a guide to how you should feel about Fox, NBC, ABC, and CBS saying yes, no, and maybe to series both old and new. R.I.P. Rock Center With Brian Williams, we barely knew you. Because we never watched you.

“Big Woman Funnel Feeder” is both the name of a great CB radio handle (“This is Big Woman Funnel Feeder. Best watch out for the smokey in the bush ’round the next bend. Tijuana taxis everywhere tonight”) and an accurate description of 23-year-old Tammy Jung, who eats 5,000 calories worth of food every day, much of which is slid into her mouth via funnel, because her “career ambition is to become as popular as possible.” According to HuffPo, via Barcroft Media TV: Tammy was once a healthy eight-stone teenager who wore skinny jeans, loved playing volleyball and going out with friends. But in a bizarre reversal of a crash diet, Tammy turned her back on her slim good looks, and spends her days indoors stuffing herself with fried chicken, donuts and whole blocks of cheese. She even allows boyfriend Johan Ubermen, 28, to pour ice cream milkshakes down her throat, in an attempt to put away 5,000 calories a day. Yes, “allows.” Tammy’s diet has seen her weight soar 3.5 stones every six months, and she now weighs 16.5 stone [230 pounds]. The once svelte young woman is piling on the pounds to earn money as a Big Beautiful Woman on internet websites and hopes to one day top 30 stone [420 pounds]. Tammy hopes to one day earn $3,100/month, which is apparently how much human dignity goes for these days.

May 10-12, 2013 will henceforth be known as the weekend we all Charleston’d down to the cineplex: My sources’ latest estimates for the 3D tentpole [The Great Gatsby] are $19.4M for Thursday/Friday, and -6% for $18M Saturday. Hollywood is expecting an overperforming $52M first weekend for the romantic drama co-financed by Village Roadshow and based on F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 classic novel. (Via) Gatsby: Based on the Novel “Daisy Pouts” by Fitz-G. Vince may not have cared for the film, but a surprising number of people did; that $52 million is far higher than anyone expected it to make, and it’s certainly more successful than 1974′s Gatsby, starring Robert Redford and Mia Farrow. You know what that movie was missing? Filter songs. The video below, which envisions the old Gatsby as the new Gatz, fixes that problem.

What if — and please hold your questions until the end — tonight's SNL is just...Gilly? Gilly cold open. Gilly monologue. Gilly musical performance. Gilly 10-to-1. Honestly, like Baxter and his wheel of cheese, I wouldn't even be mad; I'd be too impressed. OK, sure, FINE: one Target Lady, but otherwise, Gilly 24/7 (for 90 minutes). But that's probably not going to happen. SORRY. In honor of her return to SNL, today's GIFs of the Week is dedicated to Kristen Wiig and all of the (occasionally awful) characters she played over seven seasons.

Happy Mother’s Day! If there’s anyone out there reading this that just replied, “Thank you,” you have terrible kids. Today is your day; spend it doing things that don’t involve the Internet. Come back to us tomorrow, when the world won’t care about you for another 364 days. For everyone else: yeah, I forgot to send a card, too. Anyway, a lot can be learned about being a good mother from watching TV. Not literally, of course, not that my sitting six inches from the screen as a kid did any long-term damage *begins drooling, tries to count the fuzzy lines swimming in my eyeballs* but from examples shown to us by the Marge Simpsons and Tami Taylors of the world. In honor of Mother’s Day, here are 15 life lessons taught to us by 15 TV show moms.

What did we learn about Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. from the promo that ABC just released? 1. I’m never referring to it as Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. again. It’s SHIELD from here on out. 2. Seriously, Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is a terrible name for a show. 3. What are we going to hashtag it as? #SHIELD? #MAOS? Or is that taken by multiple Mao Zedongs fan fiction? 4. Why doesn’t WordPress recognize “hashtag” as a word? It’s 2013, guys. Get with the times. 5. But I digress: the clip shows a lot of women kicking ass and Agent Coulson looking like Kevin Spacey.

Virgin Group founder [Richard Branson] had his legs shaved, put on lipstick and squeezed into a red skirt to honor a bet by serving as a flight attendant Sunday on an AirAsia trip from Perth, Australia, to Malaysia. Branson lost a bet to [AirAsia chief Tony] Fernandes in 2010 after they wagered that their Formula One racing teams would finish ahead of each other. Fernandes’ team landed two spots above Branson’s. (Via) Nightmare fuel. Though I guess it’s fitting that Branson looks like Tim Curry dressed as Mommie Dearest. http://news.yahoo.com/richard-branson-swaps-suit-skirt-honor-bet-091130555.html

We're all in agreement that Jessica Walter is television's all-time mom, correct? I mean, no contest really. I honestly can't even think of another TV mom I'd pit against her for the sake of debate. Between Lucille Bluth and Malory Archer she has delivered more joy to audiences -- usually at the expense of her fictional children -- than pretty much the rest of the lot combined. What a bunch of seawards her competition is. So with Mother's Day falling smack dab in the middle of our Arrested Development on Netflix final countdown, it would be silly to not revisit all the motherly pearls of wisdom the matriarch of the Bluth Family has delighted us with over the years. Here's to even more Lucille Bluth coming soon.