reasons to go see Black Bag, ranked

listen to me

Let’s go with 10…

10. Black Bag is a spy movie for grown-ups directed by Steven Soderbergh, which feels like reason enough to get you involved, but it’s at least a good place to start

9. Do you want to see Michael Fassbender stare icy lasers at other spies while wearing stylish turtlenecks?

8. Of course you do

7. Cate Blanchett was born to stride around confidently in leather jackets and sunglasses and if she ever told me I had disappointed her I would surely disintegrate and blow away in the wind

6. If you go see a weekday matinee like I did on Monday, the theater might be so empty that it’s just you and an older couple and the older lady might gasp out loud at some of the twists in a way that’s very adorable

5. I legitimately did not see what was coming for most of the movie, which was a blast in a time when too many movies telegraph their big twists from a few miles away and expect you to be blown away when they get there

4. The whole thing is 90 minutes long and moves even faster than that, sleek and fun and breezy the way these kinds of movies should be

3. I really cannot stress in strong enough terms how good Fassbender and Blanchett are together on-screen as married spies, just smoldering glances and subterfuge the whole way through

2. You deserve a nice time at the movies

1. Black Bag rules

It’s settled. You should see it.

STUFF I TYPED

— my weekly Severance blog for Vulture, which discusses an episode where everyone is fed up and the stage is set for a wild finale

— my Friday newsletter, which opened with a section about Beyoncé and Raylan Givens playing pool

STUFF I CLICKED ON

— Claire McNear with a banger about a Jeopardy win almost a quarter-century in the making

— Mike Ryan is so good at doing interviews that it makes me wanna puke

— what a lovely conversation with Richard Kind

— Interview Magazine let Danny McBride grill Walton Goggins for a while and we are lucky enough to read the transcript

— Dan McQuade wrote a long thing about Muhammad Ali and cheeseburgers

— F1 trailer heck yeah

— Robert Pattinson is a horror movie fraidy cat like me

— sewer alligators

— Lego heist

— $90,000 Cheeto

— Tracy Morgan puked at a Knicks game

— a swan caused a traffic jam

— “4-year-old boy calls 911 on his mom for eating his ice cream: ‘Come get my mommy’”

— “Suspect in Florida jewelry theft swallows $770K worth of Tiffany earrings just before arrest, police say”

— guilty verdict in the golden toilet heist

— good update to a sweet story

— I am so mad about the canceled Prince documentary

— hackers arrested for Taylor Swift ticket fiasco

— my friend Stacey sent me this video days ago and I’ve been laughing about it ever since

jgspdx

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Okay, that’s it for this week. Please share and subscribe and go see a spy movie.