6 Culture Trends Worth Watching: Madonna, Avengers Doomsday, Million-Dollar Jackets, and More

A data-driven look at the Emmys’ cultural relevance, Hollywood’s latest layoffs, country music’s mainstream rise, and an overpriced leather jacket—plus recommended reads and datasets.

Welcome back to the Monday Roundup!

The Monday Roundup is a weekly bonus edition featuring data-driven culture stories, curated datasets, and recommended reading.

Your regular Wednesday essay stays free for everyone—this is strictly additive.

Today’s edition has six new data stories. Free readers get the first two; paid subscribers get the full thing, plus datasets and recommended reading. Enjoy!

---

In Today’s Roundup:

• Original Data Stories: Madonna’s cultural renaissance, the entertainment industry’s ongoing wave of layoffs, the Emmys’ fading cultural relevance, the hype surrounding Avengers: Doomsday, country music’s Billboard takeover, and the million-dollar jacket.

• Recommended Reads: Notable data journalism and pop culture reads from around the web.

• Unique Datasets: Ten publicly available datasets, covering everything from cataloged movie “jump scares” to Anthony Bourdain filming locations to Broadway attendance.

---

Trend 1: A Madonna Renaissance

Somehow, two things are true:

1. Madonna is back in the zeitgeist.

2. The year is 2026.

Over the past few weeks, Madonna has been the top artist trending on Reddit—and not for a tabloid scandal or a health scare, but for her music.

Among all legacy acts—that is, artists who released music before 1990—the queen of pop has seen the second-largest increase in monthly Spotify listenership in 2026.

The only singer to surpass Madonna in terms of newfound streaming interest is Michael Jackson, who is a) dead and b) the subject of an overwhelmingly sanitized biopic released this year.

Anyway, back to Madonna: how did a 67-year-old pop star find herself back in the cultural conversation? In short, she did the work.

Madonna has been on a press run for the ages in the lead-up to the release of her new dance album, Confessions II. The past few months have seen the ‘80s icon make a Coachella appearance with Sabrina Carpenter, perform at the World Cup halftime show, release a short film at the Tribeca Film Festival, stage an elaborate brand partnership with dating app Grindr, and mount several dance club pop-up performances.

The result has been a steady drumbeat of cultural interest, culminating in Confessions II debuting at No. 1 on the Billboard album chart.

If there ever were a playbook for a cultural figure to reclaim their place in the zeitgeist—without releasing a derivative biopic—then Madonna may have executed on this roadmap to perfection.

Trend 2: Entertainment Industry Layoffs

There is no business like show business. Every year, tens of thousands of industry hopefuls—be they actors, aspiring executives, or prop department enthusiasts—descend upon Los Angeles with the hope of “making it.” And while Hollywood has always been a crapshoot, the degree to which the industry is a crapshoot can vary by the week. During the streaming boom, Hollywood saw a period of sustained expansion unlike any other time in its history. And then the streaming bubble burst.

In early 2022, Netflix reported its first subscriber decline in more than a decade, sending its stock price tumbling over 50%. That disastrous earnings call, coupled with mounting concerns about inflation, convinced Wall Street that streaming’s era of boundless growth was over.

Since then, the industry has seen a litany of job cuts, including a Disney layoff two weeks ago that slashed hundreds of positions.

According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, LA entertainment employment peaked in 2023, before myriad layoffs and strikes sent this figure to a 30-year low.

And I’m sure you’re looking at this and thinking to yourself, “How can this get any worse?” Well, the answer is that it most certainly can (and will), assuming Paramount’s acquisition of Warner Bros. eventually goes through. Most likely, the numerous “synergies” between the two historic studios will yield more job loss when Warner-Mount inevitably needs to cut costs to pay back the oil magnates who financed the takeover.

I have no pithy joke to close this section; this simply stinks.

Trend 3: Do the Emmys Matter?

Open almost any streaming app, and you’ll be greeted by a glossy tile promoting that platform’s 2026 Emmy nominees. Year after year, HBO, Netflix, and Apple prominently showcase the programs recognized by television’s most prestigious awards show. Which raises an obvious question: do the Emmys matter?

The boring answer is yes. As long as streaming services continue touting their Emmy pedigree across digital banners and real-world billboards, this 77-year-old institution can plausibly claim cultural relevance.

However, the degree to which the Emmys ever mattered, and how that significance has changed over time, is far more debatable.