Ripped from the Headlines: February 2020: This Week In Culture: February 1–7, 2020

The L.A. Dodgers acquired Red Sox star right fielder Mookie Betts and lefty pitcher David Price in a three-way trade that also involved the Minnesota Twins. Boston traded Betts and Price to save money and avoid the so-called "luxury tax" on teams whose payroll exceeds $208 million in 2020. The tax was implemented to keep the league balanced, so that richer teams couldn't spend an unlimited amount and give themselves huge advantages over smaller teams.

A Brazilian documentary, The Edge of Democracy, is up for an Oscar. The film studies the conviction and imprisonment of Brazil's former president Da Silva and the impeachment and removal of his successor Dilma Rousseff, making the case that they were both innocent. Brazil's current president hates the film and is outraged at the attention it is getting.

The Mandalorian was such a big hit that Disney has announced it's holding off on any new Star Wars movies and will be focusing on TV instead. Solo and The Rise of Skywalker didn't perform as well as expected, and the latter in particular was panned by many fans as being the worst kind of pandering retread that broke little new ground. Gilded comes from the same Germanic root as gold.

Smooth Technology is a Brooklyn-based company that makes high-tech clothing for celebrities, most recently the hat with a motorized bead curtain that Billy Porter wore to the Grammys. They deliberately made it open slowly for maximum drama. The company has also made outfits for Janelle Monáe, Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, and Taylor Swift. Livery refers to uniforms worn by servants, and also to the color schemes painted on race cars.

BoJack Horseman ended its six-year run on Netflix. In an interview, executive producer and director Mike Hollingsworth talked about some of his favorite animal-themed visual gags in the show. The show has human characters, but BoJack and many others are animals. Maudlin derives from Mary Magdalene, and refers to someone or something that's excessively sad or emotional. Emo is a good contemporary synonym.

In the wake of the Houston Astros' sign-stealing scandal, former player and Cincinnati manager Pete Rose has petitioned for reinstatement in baseball. Rose was banned from the sport in 1989 for betting on games while managing a team. His previous requests for reinstatement have been denied. Rose, 78, is the all-time leader in at-bats, hits, and games played, but is ineligible for the hall of fame due to the ban.

A small fossil of a previously unknown type of thalattosaur has been discovered in Alaska. The creature, named Gunakadeit joseeae, was about the size of an iguana and lived in the ocean. It had a needle-like beak sort of thing that it likely used to dig food out of little crevices in coral reefs. The creature lived approximately 200 million years ago, when what is now Alaska was considerably farther south and much warmer.

Viola Davis will star as First Lady Michelle Obama in a Showtime series called, appropriately, First Ladies. The series will also depict Eleanor Roosevelt and Betty Ford, and will focus on their influence on their husbands' policies and decisions and the ways in which they helped shape the country's history. Portray comes from the French portraire, meaning "to draw." It's the same root that gave us portrait.

The series finale of The Good Place aired, ending an improbably successful four-year run for a show that combined a sitcom with a serious examination of moral philosophy. Treacle originates all the way back in the Ancient Greek theriaki, meaning "antidote," as in medicine given to heal a snake bite or similar venomous wound. Now it refers to a sugar syrup, and if you say that something is treacly, whether it's a dessert or a movie, you mean that it's too sweet.

Miss Americana, a documentary about Taylor Swift, is out on Netflix. The film is receiving good reviews for its frank depiction of her struggles with everything from an eating disorder to her decision to speak up about political issues after years of avoiding controversy. Unrequited is most often used to modify the word love. If you love someone and they don't feel the same way about you, that's unrequited.