Competitive Eaters, Breaking Bad in Space, and More Viral Videos

BONUS: Competitive Eater Goes to TGI Friday’s

The Daily Beast sent competitive eater, and sometimes rapper, Eric ‘Badlands’ Booker to TGI Friday’s to take advantage—full advantage—of their ‘endless appetizer’ campaign. Can Friday’s keep up with Badlands’ badass appetite? You’ll have to see for yourself.

5. ‘Game of Thrones’ Parenting Theory

Who knew Westeros had birthers? “R+L=J” supports a theory regarding the real parents of everyone’s favorite bastard (in the literal sense), Jon Snow. Close readers of George R.R. Martin’s books might not find this surprising; however, this is for the rest of us who don’t have the time to scrutinize over 4,000 pages of published material to venture a guess at a fictional character’s true lineage.

4. ‘Rude’ from the Dad’s POV

Depending on your age, “Rude” by Sublime-esque ‘90s throwback MAGIC! (yes, all caps and exclamation point) strikes you as either a sweet ska ballad about star-crossed lovers, or an imposition by some snot-nosed entitled jerk asking for permission to sleep with your daughter. This dad read it as the latter and wrote his own lyrical rebuttal to the tune.

3. ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic’s Grammar Lesson

At least one thing has gone right for Robin Thicke this year: the King of Pop Parody “Weird Al” Yankovic has honored him with a spoof of the creepy sex anthem “Blurred Lines.”

In “Word Crimes,” the Weird One gets grammatical on us, schooling listeners on using proper English, and Thicke’s naked models are swapped out for dancing punctuation marks. However, that semi-colon really should put on some pants.

2. JIBO: The World’s First Family Robot

It looks like part of a sci-fi blockbuster’s viral marketing campaign but this is apparently the real deal. JIBO is a robot for the whole family, currently crowdfunding for development. It can take pictures at get-togethers, organize your appointments, and even read your child a bedtime story. And it’s cute as a button to boot.

Its IndieGoGo campaign has met its goal six times over and counting, so it looks like this plastic pal is on track to hit the market by 2016.

1. ‘Breaking Bad’ in Space

Sorry to disappoint you, but this isn’t an alternate version of Breaking Bad wherein Walter White starts an intergalactic meth cartel with space aliens—though someone should definitely pitch that.

A contest sponsored by tvtag had users vote on which iconic TV character bobblehead they would send into space via balloon. Heisenberg himself was the winner. As unusual a promotion as it is, it’s a lot of fun to watch the results.