The two Mannie Fresh beats are total unalloyed joy they hit like Reginald VelJohnson returning for another Die Hard. The new album exists in conversation with all of Wayne’s past work, and given that Wayne is easily the single most influential rapper of this century, it also exists in conversation with all the music that Wayne has inspired. It’s more of a Liam Neeson Non-Stop “Oh shit, that was pretty good!” situation. It’s better, for instance, than either of the two latter-day 21st-century Die Hard movies. If you think about it like that, Tha Carter V is an unqualified triumph. We know that a new Die Hard is inevitably going to come off as at least a little bit of a Die Hard ripoff. We know that the Die Hard ripoff has become the dominant form of action-movie storytelling. We know that we’re receiving a new Die Hard movie in a time when Die Hard ripoffs have reached market saturation. We want to see that old shit-talking persona, a little more seasoned and grizzled, coming to life in front of us again. We want maybe a scene or two like the bit in Live Free Or Die Hard where he uses a police car as a projectile to explode a helicopter. Mostly, we just want Willis to give us some echo of that old feeling. And anyway, they don’t make movies like that anymore. Bruce Willis can’t jump off of buildings like that anymore. We can’t expect it to be like the first three. Here’s how I think about it: A new Tha Carter album is like a new Die Hard movie.

Lil wayne carter 5 viperial