Uh oh, Pepper looks pissed. And Tony looks alone. What happened to all his friends?

Garry Shandling makes his big debut as Senator Stern, so Tony mocks him, naturally.

See Tony is alone. Empty chairs. Empty soul. It's lonely at the top.

But wait, it's Rhodey, he's back...and he looks pissed. And who's that to Rhodey's left? It's Sam Rockwell, as Justin Hammer. Did they walk in together? And where did Pepper go? Where's Happy?

Same sexual chemistry between Pepper and Tony, check. But then again I think RDJ is so charming he could have chemistry with a lamp post... lucky lamp post.

Iron Man is America, and a rock star. And look in the background — it's the Iron Man dancers, thus proving the slutty Halloween rule to be true: any outfit can be made whorish.

These gloves could very well be the best little party favors ever. Please hand these out at Comic Con!

Whiplash is obsessed. See? See? He has newspaper clippings. And newspaper clipping are to stalkers what glasses are to shy mousy girls with a hot girl dying to get out inside: stereotypical. But let's assume that since he's spent so much time cataloguing the family story, that this grudge may go way, way back. Since he's had time to make a scrap book.

Who hit Tony?

The garage is all cleaned up and stocked with new rich guy toys. Bruce Wayne who?

What is happening to Tony's neck?

Yikes it's spreading. Tony is literally turning into an Iron Man. Also, he could be turning into a human computer, which has happened in the Iron Man comics before.

More Justin Hammer, and in perfect timing with Whiplash's "shark" comment.

Nick Fury just wants to get motherfucking Tony onto the motherfucking team.

More Iron Man-ettes. I suspect this may be a banner year for the cosplay fans.

Scarlett Johansson as Natasha Romanoff in her Black Widow "business casual" attire.

War Machine prototype!

Is the Black Widow working for Rhodey? Is that her in the background?

Black Widow in her ass kicking attire, is she beating up Happy? I bet Jon Favreau just loved that.

Whiplash finally shows us what his lightsaber whips can do — which is break Tony's car.

Which he does.

I'm still not sold on the Whiplash outfit, but it does look pretty bad ass from behind.

Uh oh — will Tony be Whiplashed in half, or will the bad guy just show off some more? Answer: Show off.

Whiplash has nasty metal mouth.

What is this flying contraption? It looks like it's shooting at Iron Man? Multiple Mecha suits?

A first look at War Machine, and Tony's new suit, with a triangle chest plate. Is this due to the metal veins? Also the background is filled with power suits, almost like an Armor War...

War Machine and Tony fight other mechas and you get a faceful of War Machines shoulder gun, and Tony's fully reconstructed suit, Mark VI. Very nice. So who thinks they are filming the Armor Wars story?

15. Russian Glamour, June 2009
Beyoncé's skin looked digitally darkened on the cover of Russian Glamour — and the editors had a guide! A magazine called Joy used the same shot in December 2007. Was something lost in translation? Save your "black Russian" jokes until the end.

14. L'Oreal, August 2008
Beyoncé's skin seemed very light in ads for Feria haircolor. One theory: she was washed out by the strong lighting usually used in shooting hair.

13. Vogue, November 2009
The cast of Nine is chock-full of gorgeous women, but this shot is a mindscramble of random rays of sunlight in hair and dresses with edges so sharp they look like they're for paper dolls. As I wrote in October: "I'm guessing [Annie] Leibovitz shot them each separately and then did a composite, but when you have a person who doesn't cast a shadow on the lady next to her, then that person is a vampire." Poor Kate Hudson looks like she was slapped on as an afterthought.

12. Complex, April/May 2009
Kim Kardashian's waist was cinched, her thighs were slimmed, her skin skin smoothed out and her hairline was cleaned up. Plus, her head appears to be a different shape in the "after" image. Who would have thought a skull could be made "sexier"?

11. Self, September 2009
Kelly Clarkson's "Total Body Confidence" came from digitally slimming her waist and behind. Two Self editors explained that the cover: "is not, as in a news photograph, journalism. It is, however, meant to inspire women to want to be their best."

10. King Arthur poster, 2004
Movie marketers felt they must, they must, they must increase the bust. Ironically, Keira Knightley told the Guardian that she lost her chest, doing archery and preparing for the role:

To fight, convincingly, shoulder to shoulder, she had to do that thing that is so de rigueur, which is totally to change your body shape. "I was about three times the size I am now. It worried me, but it was cool, it was a body that was doing what it should do. I haven't got a clue because I don't weigh myself, but it was all muscle and I was big. My neck disappeared. My chest flattened even more. It wasn't the most feminine thing in the world, but it worked for the part, because there was strength there, and it was needed."

Of course, Hollywood can't imagine a world in which people would see a movie starring an athletic, flat-chested woman. So a digital boob job followed.

9. Redbook, July 2007
The crazy thing about the Faith Hill Redbook cover is not that it was Photoshopped — it's that this is the standard amount of digital altering that goes into a cover. Unlike some true Photoshop disasters, there are no alarming mistakes here to tip you off. That makes it easy to accept the retouched image without even blinking. Faith Hill is a beautiful woman. But she needed 11 different kinds of alterations before she could be on the cover of Redbook. What a world.

8. Campari calendar, 2008
Jessica Alba: Just another woman whose real body wasn't good enough. In this case, her waist needed to be nipped in so she could shill liquor.

7. Vogue, May 2008
RoboGwyneth looks like a robot, or an alien, depending on whom you ask. One thing is for sure: Her head and neck are not in the same space-time continuum.

6. Redbook, June 2003
Jennifer Aniston's head was placed on to Jennifer Aniston's body — from another photo shoot. At the time, her publicist, Steven Huvane, said: "It's a combination of three pictures. If you're going to do it, then at least match her head up to her body, and make the neck look like it belongs to her. I still can't figure out which exact picture the face came from." A Redbook spokeswoman downplayed the changes: "The only things that were altered in the cover photo were the color of her shirt and the length of her hair, very slightly, in order to reflect her current length."

The neck does look alarmingly unreal, and her head and waist are out of sync somehow. Angelina is surely to blame.

5.Redbook, July 2003
The month after the Aniston debacle, Redbook was at it again: According to USA Today, "[Julia's] head comes from a paparazzi shot taken at the 2002 People's Choice awards. Her body, meanwhile, is from the Notting Hill movie premiere [in 1999]." Julia's publicist, Marcy Engelman, said, at the time: "It's a shame they didn't use the body that went with the head, because it was a great Giorgio Armani pantsuit (that she wore to the People's Choice awards)."

4. Newsweek, March 2005
The editors used Martha's head and a model's body, because Ms. Stewart was still in jail when the issue was being put together. It wasn't supposed to be a photograph, anyway, it was art: "The piece that we commissioned was intended to show Martha as she would be, not necessarily as she is,'' Lynn Staley, assistant managing editor at Newsweek, told The New York Times. Staley acknowledged that the cover carried a disclaimer: ''In this case, we identified this piece as a photo illustration." As Martha would say, it's a "good thing" you did.

3. Seventeen, May 2003
Think about all the Buffy plots which could have been orchestrated around Sarah Michelle Gellar's weird wrist appendage over there on the left, if her arm actually looked like that.

2. GQ, February 2003.
Some people saw Titanic over and over again — but they never saw those legs, on the left. Kate Winslet was pissed about being trimmed down on this cover, saying:

"The retouching is excessive. I do not look like that and more importantly I don't desire to look like that. I actually have a Polaroid that the photographer gave me on the day of the shoot… I can tell you they've reduced the size of my legs by about a third. For my money it looks pretty good the way it was taken."

1. Ralph Lauren Blue Label ad, October 2009
In which model Filippa Hamilton was turned into a string of spaghetti.

I decided to ask a few professionals. Raves and nominations notwithstanding, as casting director Mark Bennett (The Hurt Locker, Junebug) puts it when asked for his professional opinion, "Unfortunately Hollywood is still a system that doesn't produce a lot of great parts for black women and doesn't produce a lot of parts for women who aren't conventionally beautiful. And that's not going to change overnight."

In a piece last month on The Root, cultural critic Stanley Crouch was outright pessimistic:

"Gabby Sidibe better enjoy her fame while she can because black actresses never have less than a hard row to hoe. Even if the inner life they bring to characters is as beautiful as they are physically, they have little chance."

Crouch cited several black actresses whose careers were, as he puts it, "pissed away by the system," and argues that even with Precious's success, at the end of the day, "Hollywood will continue to go along as it has gone." And he didn't even touch on the fact that Hollywood has had little use for any women larger than a size zero.

So far, Sidibe has shot a pilot for Showtime – The C Word, a dark comedy starring Laura Linney – and also wrapped a Sundance lab film called Yelling to the Sky. But her most significant post-Precious performance has probably been on the talk show circuit.

The greatest risk Sidibe initially faced was best articulated (inadvertently) by Roger Ebert in his November 4 Chicago Sun Times review of Precious:

"Her work is still another demonstration of the mystery of some actors, who evoke feelings in ways beyond words and techniques. She so completely creates the Precious character that you rather wonder if she's very much like her."

You can wonder, but the answer is no. "It's called acting," her manager, Jill Kaplan, says. Sidibe herself has skillfully, but seemingly effortlessly, put space between her character and herself with her television appearances, which exhibit both poise and comic timing.

"When you see her being interviewed, she's so charming. You look at her and say, I'd like to watch her in other parts so you can see her acting different personalities," says Bennett.

Both Bennett and Billy Hopkins, the casting agent who co-discovered Sidibe at an open casting call (and Precious director Lee Daniels' former partner), point out that cable television offers a far greater range and depth of roles for actresses. And they both speculate that she'd make a good talk show host. (An appealing, if entirely premature, prospect).

Hopkins sounds determinedly optimistic about Hollywood's receptiveness to an actress like Sidibe. "Is she a hard type to cast? Yes. But is she talented? Yes. So I think those will balance each other out," he says.

Eyde Belasco, who cast Sidibe in Yelling To The Sky and has worked on movies like (500) Days of Summer and Half Nelson, writes in an email that her own choice had "very little to do with her look and everything to do with her amazing acting abilities." She adds, "I think the best types of roles for Gabby going forward, to keep her from being typecast, are ones that are not linked to her look. Maybe it's about taking on a great supporting role (such as her role in Yelling To She Sky) that has very little to do with her physical appearance and all to do with her performance. If an actor can afford to do it, it's about waiting for the right role. Gabby does have a very specific look. But, hopefully, filmmakers and casting directors will want the best actress for the role."

It can be hard to get insiders to discuss industry prejudices on the record, but that doesn't mean they don't exist. "Hollywood tends to think of actors like Gabby as being perfect as a white person's friend. She'll have to work really hard to distinguish herself in their eyes," says Bennett. "The soft prejudice that she's going to face is going to be getting cast in parts that aren't written for a black girl. At the end of the day, I find there's a certain risk aversion in terms of Hollywood casting. It wouldn't surprise me if she finds her most fulfilling professional opportunities in the coming years outside of Hollywood."

Bennett's advice to her is not to wait to pursue the parts she wants: "It's a mistake for actors to sit around and assume that Hollywood as a monolith will have imagination. Actors have to insist on what they're capable of."

Kaplan, Sidibe's manager, is reluctant, for obvious reasons, to have the actress pigeonholed or even discuss that risk. She says Sidibe has gotten all kinds of scripts sent her way. "It doesn't have to be about changing Hollywood's ideals – it's just about a talented actress," she says.

She adds, "I think she can do anything. She's a prodigy – she's very funny. She really loves Judd Apatow movies and comedies in general. We're looking for a big fun comedy for her, or maybe something romantic…She loves superhero movies."

Speaking of Apatow and comedies, I tracked down Allison Jones, the casting director who has worked with him since Freaks and Geeks, and who was also responsible for the inarguably inspired casting on Curb Your Enthusiasm and The Office. Here's what she writes:

A good comedy director I think values instincts more than line readings...so if her comedy instincts are as solid as her dramatic ones (on talk shows she is a riot and so delightful), then she will have no problem... Someone's funny, she's funny. Someone's good, she's good. [In addition] as much as anyone's physical appearance can limit their appropriateness for a role (including the stick-thin actresses), she will not be right for everything. But maybe there are more opportunities out there rather than fewer.

Hopefully those opportunities will exceed the comic roles that the industry has so far offered larger black women (or men pretending to be them)—where their sexuality is a punchline in itself.

As the awards season kicks off, Sidibe's name is already on many ballots — she was just nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for best actress — and expected to be on more, including those for the Oscars (announced February 3). And maybe that's what it'll take to clinch her broader appeal, should anyone need convincing. Kaplan doesn't want to make predictions. "I can't say what's going to happen," she says. "I'm definitely trying. I'm working on it right now. People are going to see outside the box."

Hollywood: Same As It Ever Was [The Root]

Related: Et Tu, Amy Poehler? What's So Funny About Desiring A Big, Black Woman? [What Tami Said]
Sumpin' Turrrrble: SNL's Keenan Thompson Performs Minstrel Act [Racialicious]

We know Sarah Palin isn't the biggest fan of Vogue, but we think she'd do really well guest-editing her own issue. So we've worked up a sample cover in the style of our Cover Lies feature (in which we expose how little relationship ladymags, like Sarah Palin, have to reality). While the real Vogue bows to the recession with its $300 "Steal" of the Month, Palin could show us how to get a $150,000 wardrobe for free — and how to pick a $700/night hotel, complete with robe and slippers. In lieu of book reviews, she could offer up a bunch of snide remarks about Katie Couric — "the perky one" probably can't read anyway. And for balance, Palin could add some media elite contributors, like Trig-birther Andrew Sullivan and Rebecca Johnson. (Johnson works for the fake America but the real Vogue, and says all Palin wanted to talk about in her much-maligned interview was "drilling for oil" — but what else is there, anyway?) In fact, right after a Jeffrey Steingarten piece on moose-meat, Going Vogue should include a free sample of premium Alaska crude. We hear it gets rid of both wrinkles and endangered wildlife.

Fact Check: Palin's Book Goes Rogue On Some Facts [AP, via Yahoo News]
Palin's Katie Couric Myths [Daily Beast]
Palin's Ego Trip [Daily Beast]

Fade in. Ms. Gaga, ever the generous host, is just chilling with her minions, listening to music.

She is wearing her razor-blade sunglasses, because a girl can never be too careful. The world assaults us with images! We must fight back! (Or, as she told MTV News: "I wanted to design a pair for some of the toughest chicks and some of my girlfriends - don't do this at home! - they used to keep razor blades in the side of their mouths… That tough female spirit is something that I want to project. It's meant to be, 'This is my shield, this is my weapon, this is my inner sense of fame, this is my monster.") I certainly hope you're taking notes.

FYI: Motherboard, barbed wire or fine screen door mesh manicures are the new hot shit. Adjust accordingly.

Suddenly, there's a flash of light.

A room! With Ukranian vodka! This must be a dream. Or a nightmare?

Coffin-like pods line the floor. Note the one which reads "Monster," as therein lies our heroine.

By the way: Since The Lady refers to her creative team as the Haus of Gaga, this scenario, naturally, takes place in the Bath Haus of Gaga.

The Lady emerges, wrapped up for freshness.

It's important to loosen up the joints and muscles after being transported — nay, kidnapped — into a questionable dimension. Working out with friends keeps you motivated.

Speeding through a hole in the time/space continuum often leaves a layer of grime. Bathing is a must.

Here, her eyes are wide with knowledge, not fear: She is a captive!

Product placement! Did you know that Dr. Dre, who has his own Beats By Dre headphones, worked with The Lady to make Heartbeats by Lady Gaga?

Back to the story: Gaga is ripped from the bath by her captors.

She is really just an innocent young thing, what could they possibly want with her?

Well, first they'd like to strip her of her latex garments…

…Then they'd like to force imported vodka down her throat. The usual Tuesday night stuff.

Fueled by liquor, Gaga is trussed up in a sparkly ensemble, robbed of her Burberry overcoat and forced to dance.

So many male bidders, so little time!

The Man With The Gold Chin Strap takes an interest in Ms. Gaga. Gold+Man= Goldman? As in Goldman Sachs? Is Gaga part of the bailout package?

Her brain aches; she must make a choice. She can flee. Sure. But she can also stay and dance her ass off, use this man the way he wants to use her. She could really, really use the money, you see…

…She's got a little problem with her spine. And Oxford won't cover the surgery.

So she dances. She seduces him because she has to. And because she can.

According to The Woman's Dictionary Of Symbols & Sacred Objects, the bond between cats and women has always been strong. There was a time that the patriarchy, suspicious of this connection, would accuse any woman seen talking to or petting a cat of witchcraft. Cats were sacred to the Ancient Egyptians, and festivals for the the cat goddess Bast were huge. The Norse goddess Freya rode in a chariot drawn by cats, and felines were generally thought to be magic. So save your shaved pussy jokes until the end.

Oooh, looky! Our favorite ankle-snapping Alexander McQueen shoes from his Spring 2010 show in paris. You know, the Futuristic Interplanetary Mutant Alien Queen one. Not Derelicte In Wonderland… that's so Fall 2009.

If you saw the McQueen ensembles and thought to yourself, "Who wears that? Now you know.

Anyway: Gaga drags herself and her bear carcass peignoir to do what she knows she must do.

Mr. Goldman awaits, hand creeping toward his stimulus package.

He'd like to see what he's purchased.

She's happy to oblige.

But! Little does he know — she has power, strength, and can, like a young Drew Barrymore, start fires with her mind.

(See, she has already informed the others that there will be a revolt! That's where the red and the leather come in: Viva La Revolucion!)

Yes, the bed is aflame. Fire can be symbolic of passion, but in this case, she is using it as a weapon, to destroy her enemy.

In the end, her sparkbra is saved, but Mr. Goldman? He is merely a charred skeleton.

The moral: Buy flame-retardant lingerie.

Here's the video clip, sans commentary. Enjoy.

Lady Gaga Says 'Bad Romance' Video Is About 'Tough Female Spirit' [MTV News]
Bad Romance Exclusive Premiere [Facebook]
Lady Gaga Bad Romance [YouTube]

Earlier: Questions About The High Fashion & Domestic Violence In Lady GaGa's Video
An Analysis Of The Underlying Themes In Britney's New Candie's Commerical

Scientology refugee Marc Headley has written a book called Blown For Good—featuring a dramatic, action-scene-type cover—detailing his 15 years of work inside Scientology. The Village Voice interviewed him about his 1990 "auditing" session performed by Days of Thunder-era Tom Cruise himself.

"You do a lot of things with a book and a bottle," Headley says. "It's known as the book-and-bottle routine." Cruise, he says, would instruct Headley to speak to a book, telling it to stand up, or to sit down, or otherwise to move somewhere.

"You do the same with the bottle. You talk to it. You do it with an ashtray too," he says. "You tell the ashtray, 'Sit in that chair.' Then you actually go over and put the ashtray on the chair. Then you tell the ashtray, 'Thank you.' Then you do the same thing with the bottle, and the book. And you do this for hours and hours."

This was supposed " to get your intention over to the bottle...to rehabilitate your ability to control things." Well then. Tom Cruise can control books and bottles with his mind and don't ever let anyone tell you different.

Headley also says that there are only about 10,000 Scientologists in the whole world. They could be whupped by the Unitarians!
[Village Voice. Pic by Richard Blakeley]

On the show, it is definitely a space lizard (maybe Balloon Boy's dad's conspiracy theories about lizard people were right all along!), but like a Chicago Tribune review by Glenn Garvin points out, it could also be about our nerd president.

Welcome to ABC's "V," the most fascinating and bound to be the most controversial new show of the fall television season. Nominally a rousing sci-fi space opera about alien invaders bent on the conquest (and digestion) of all humanity, it's also a barbed commentary on Obamamania that will infuriate the president's supporters and delight his detractors.

Anna is the beautiful and charming leader of the aliens—knows as V's because they are visitors—and she tells the world that her people can fix everything that is wrong with society. She has the liberal media brainwashed, and they all go along with stories about how great and wonderful she is. Of course, there is a fringe group who rebel against her and want to expose them as the evil-doing, reptile skinned, foreigners that they really are. Of course, these are the heroes of the show. Wow, that really does sound like the teabaggers! There's even a religious rebel named Father Jack, which is basically an anagram of George W. Bush.

It certainly wouldn't be new for a sci-fi series to be an allegory about modern society (Battlestar Galactica, anyone?) but it would be sort of odd for a sci-fi show on a major network to give credence to tactics and delusions of the far right. The birthers will be lapping up a show about a foreign-born president who comes to snatch society out of their clutches, and Glenn Back and his cronies will love to see a media that is overtaken by liberals and keeps the truth away from the "real Americans." But what will everyone else think?

The sci-fi culture usually veers to the left in its political allegory (again, see Battlestar or this summer's upbeat Star Trek that was an endorsement for the hopeful future that the Obama administration promised to usher in). The original 1983 miniseries that the show is based on was an anti-fascist message that preyed on "the aliens are coming, the aliens are coming" invasion fears of the Cold War. This is what it has been warped into. We find it hard to believe that thinly-veiIed conservative propaganda will find a strong foothold with the core sci-fi audience, and as for those leaning to the right, they tend to like their entertainment much more straightforward. Why try to figure out what all those lizard people mean when they can just watch Jack Bauer bash people's heads in on 24? That's their idea of fun.

Our prognosis, keep picking on the president and the only letters that V will get are D.O.A.

The brilliant graphic illustration above is a very scientific illustration of just how to turn watchable televison programming into fast-food shilling drivel. Here's the technical explanation of just what's going on above:

In one embodiment, as shown in FIG. 1, a conventional advertisement 10 shown during televisin program's commercial break promotes a new product 12 of, for example, a fast-food establishment. The advertisement 10 is attempting to sell the particular product 12. A program-advancing element 16, such as the knife in this particular example, is introduced into the advertisement 10 to form a program-integrated advertisement 14. The program-advancing element relates to the television program and can be a program-promoting element, i.e., a viewer associates the knife with the program. Additionally, the two characters dealing with the knife in the program-integrated advertisement 14 may themseves be program-advancing elements, if they are characters in the program.

We came across this technological marvel via The Hollywood Reporter's legal blog, THR, esq which wrote about what must be one of the most amazing lawsuits of all time. This legalistic rabbit hole's silliness is so profound that it makes us think that it might be time to throw the entire judicial system out the window and muddle by on mob rule for a few decades.

THR writes:

Delaware-based ad agency Denizen is suing media agency Mindshare for stealing an idea to integrate a brand of Vaseline into a Lifetime miniseries called "Maneater."

In the complaint, Denizen says that TV networks face the problem of viewers not paying attention to ads in between segments of a show and claims to have "created the concept of 'program integrated advertisement' in order to entice viewers to pay attention to advertisements in various media, including, but not limited to, television, radio, and the Internet.

Denizen isn't actually suing for stealing the idea of product placement, but they are accusing Mindshare of making off with trade secrets about how to implement world class product placement that the Denizen folks supposedly let them in on during a meeting between the two companies.

But Denizen isn't just claiming spuriously, "yeah, we thought of that first"; they actually filed a patent on product placement, which they call "Program Integrated Commercials." Denizen's patent must rank as one of the most amazing legal documents ever produced, demonstrating the legal system's ability to absorb any level of ridiculousness and turn it into mind-numbing deadly serious jargon.

The patent starts out bemoaning the desperate state of advertising, noting the wreckage TiVo has wrecked and the failures of basically every attempt to get people excited about watching ads, what with these ungrateful viewers changing channels and fast forwarding and all.

The patent then claims, "The present invention comprises a method and system for incorporating thematic content from a particular television program into product or service advertisements (commercials) for a sponsor or the program or network."

Actually, when one gets into it the invention is far more sinister than merely sticking some products into a TV show wrapped around cockamamie plot points, but involves an attempt to take the characters out of the show and stick them into the actual ads based on cockamamie plot points, making the audience have to watch the ads themselves to be able to follow the plot of the show.

The verbal contortions in which the patent goes to explain this are fairly breathtaking. The following graph, for instance, attempts to codify this breakthrough in the science of forcing products into people's brains: "The program-advancing element is specific to a program or is associated with a program element such that it is capable of being recognized by a viewer. This includes, but is not limited to, character actions, setting descriptions, objects, sound recognition, and character dialogue, etc."

That's right, Denizen thunk that up! Take that Sterling Cooper!

You can browse this entire historic document by clicking one of the thumbnails below.

Nikki, the internet remembers everything. For instance, it remembers — courtesy our RSS reader which handily enough tracks changes in blog posts — how you originally characterized the opening numbers of the new Michael Jackson movie This Is It as "extraordinary," and changed it to "disappointing" after getting spun the other way. One of those is true!

This isn't the first time she's turned 180 degrees without any disclosure as to what changed her mind. In Tad Friend's profile of Finke in The New Yorker, he retells the tale of how she once posted an item claiming that Jeff Berg was out at the talent agency ICM, only to later erase that text and replace it with a new item that started, "Let me knock down that rumor making the rounds that Jeff Berg is supposedly leaving ICM." She told Friend that the original, completely wrong post "was up for about a minute." There's no real way to tell because she never noted the change and never changed the original time stamp.

There was also an incident concerning her "scoop" about who was going to direct the third Twilight movie:

Finke is conscientious about fixing errors noted by her sources, but she is less hospitable to challenges from colleagues. In March, Patrick Goldstein, who writes the Big Picture blog for the Los Angeles Times, reproved Finke for getting her facts wrong when she wrote a story saying that Summit Entertainment was telling people that Juan Antonio Bayona would direct the third installment of the hit vampire series "Twilight." (The job eventually went to David Slade.) Finke might have simply riposted with further evidence that Summit executives had picked Bayona but were embarrassed that he hadn't taken the job; instead, she wrote a followup story blasting Goldstein: "I'd hate to think Patrick is becoming one of those journalists who, because they can't break news, dump on those who do."

Other bloggers jumped in, delighted to see Finke under fire. One pointed out that Finke had quietly returned to her original post about Bayona and inserted qualifying material, including the sentence "I'm not saying he's been offered the job or hired, which in Hollywood involves deal memos, signed contracts, and the like." She explains, "I didn't change what I wrote-I added to it."

So, here's what Finke wrote this morning about the This Is It numbers:

THURSDAY 10:30 AM: Sony just announced that Michael Jackson's This Is It opened Wednesday to an extraordinary start all around the world in 99 countries with a 1-day gross of $20.1 million. The film opened to 7.4 million domestically and $12.7 internationally. Foreign highlights include strong performances from the UK $1.940, France $1.370, Japan $1.160, Germany $1.050, China $.730, Sweden $.490, Holland $.390, Mexico $.370, Brazil $.350, and Australia $.330. The film opens in 10 additional territories today. The studio believes that the worldwide launch, with very strong performance across North America, Europe, Latin America and Asia, represents an amazing beginning for the film and...

Here's what she says now:

THURSDAY 10:30 AM: Sony just announced that Michael Jackson's This Is It opened Wednesday all around the world in 99 countries with a 1-day gross of $20.1 million. Immediately, Hollywood considered that disappointing after all the pre-sales hype surrounding the concert footage and its 2-week limited run. The film opened to a paltry $7.4 million domestic even including Tuesday's $2.2M late night showings. That's almost 50% less than the $17M Sony hoped for, and 39% less than the $12M Hollywood expected. "This is not promising," a rival studio exec just told me. Even overseas, where Michael Jackson is considered more popular than here, its solid but not spectacular debut was $12.7 million internationally. (Foreign numbers included UK $1.9M, France $1.3M, Japan $1.1M, Germany $1.0M, China $730K, Sweden $490K, Holland $390K, Mexico $370K, Brazil $350K, and Australia $330K. The film opens in 10 additional territories today.) The studio tried to put the best face on the bow, claiming the worldwide launch featured "very strong performance" across North America, Europe, Latin America and Asia, and "represents an amazing beginning for the film and a reaffirmation of the global appeal of Michael Jackson". Uh, no. In North America, This Is It took in the highest gross ever for a Wednesday in October, which is a rather minor record. "The studio expects strong word of mouth and impressive critical acclaim to continue to drive ticket sales," a Sony spokesman said. There was some good news for the studio: the movie received an "A" Cinemascore across the board.

Interestingly, Finke posted the first one at 10:30 a.m., and then got a call or e-mail from some sniping exec telling her how "Hollywood considered" the numbers disappointing, and then traveled back in time and posted the second one at "10:30 a.m.". This woman's powers transcend temporal instantiation. No wonder no one can take a picture of her.

We called Finke to get her reaction and had a delightful conversation. Here's what she said on the record: "You're full of shit. Gawker doesn't practice journalism and lives to impugn those who do." She followed up with an email: "I'm flattered that Gawker reads me so closely, especially when I had the Sony press release up for all of a few minutes. Once I had a chance to analyze the numbers, I updated that they were disappointing." When Nikki Finke regurgitates press releases without analysis, she only does it for a minute.

UPDATE: At 3:44 p.m. EST, we changed the lead tag on this item to "get me rewrite," because this new-fangled tag system rendered our original choice of "do-overs" as "doovers," which looked silly, right?

Arianna Huffington has allowed her editors to run ultra-close ups of the aging body of Vogue's Anna Wintour ("what does she really look like?") and now actresses Lindsay Lohan ("unedited" and splotchy) and Elizabeth Hurley (a bit sweaty). It's a case of her unprofitable company's need for monetizable, non-political Web traffic (read: cheap celebrity clicks) running headlong into Huffington's need to suck up to celebs, who write for her site and come to her parties and help her seem very glamorous.

We won't lecture Huffington on her company's too-often-shoddy attempts to make money in the online publishing racket. At least, not in this post. But we will keep her honest: If Huffington is going to run unedited pictures of others, it's only fair there should be some unedited pictures of her out there.

Click any of the images below to pop-up large, hi-res versions. (Warning, this may slow down your web browser and ruin your lunch.) We've played by HuffPo rules: Posed, red carpet pictures with no editing. We've also excerpted a highlight, as Huffington did with Wintour.

UPDATE: Jessica Wakeman at The Frisky notes that the first chapter of Huffington's book On Becoming Fearless is about positive body image. Plastering someone's picture on HuffPo is certainly one way to nudge that person toward becoming "fearless."

Not only is Detroit a great place to film a movie like Red Dawn 2 because they'll allow you to blow up downtown buildings without a care in the world, but also because folks in certain parts of the region will futilely shout the name of a certain non-indigenous-to-Michigan furry animal on a fall Saturday without any prodding whatsoever. Usually it's with the word "Go" attached to the front of it — but that can be fixed in post-production, right? Anyway, here's the shot of that Humvee we were talking about above.

We knew selling Hummer to the Chinese would lead to disaster — and us having to fend off the red menace with nothing but a Dodge Ram. There's a slew of other pics of filming in downtown Detroit here.

Anyone else take any shots? If so, drop 'em in the comments below.

Click "next" to get the low-down on the five-oh in the 9C1s

Movie: Nothing To Lose
Year: 1997
Type: 1990 Chevrolet Caprice 9C1
Role: Oh man, Martin Lawrence movies. This is a classic 9C1 done up in a fake highway patrol livery. Given the movie is supposed to be contemporaneous in 1996 it's a little questionable that this vehicle would still be in service in this great condition, though we've seen local sheriffs drive in older cars.

Movie: The Bone Collector
Year: 1999
Type: 1992 Chevrolet Caprice SSV K-9 Unit
Role: Carrying police officers and K9 unit to the scene of the crime. We love wagons, and the SSV wagons were popular with police forces for non-patrol units such as K9 (seen here), special investigations, and special traffic duty.

Credit: IMCDB.org

Movie: Groundhog Day
Year: 1993
Type: 1980 Chevrolet Caprice 9C1
Role: The police chief uses it to chase down a suicidal Billy Murray/Groundhog combination. This is once again another example of older Caprices being limited to small town duty. There's something iconic

Credit: IMCDB.org

Movie: 2 Fast 2 Furious
Year: 2003
Type: 1995 Chevrolet Caprice 9C1
Role: Chasing those 2 bad 2 be stopped guys, the 9C1 typically manages to keep up with even the most hopped-up rides in films. Because this is a 1995, we assume it has LT1 V8 power and thus is able to blow the doors off your average Honda Civic.

Credit: IMCDB.org

Movie: The Matrix Reloaded
Year: 2003
Type: 1995 Chevrolet Caprice 9C1
Role: Attempting to kill Neo. There were so many GM vehicles in this movie you knew you weren't going to see a Crown Vic. There's also something decidedly more sinister about the 9C1.

Credit: IMCDB.org

Movie: Bad Boys II
Year: 2003
Type: 1994 Chevrolet Caprice 9C1
Role: Getting smashed up as the bad guys, not to be confused with the bad boys, who are tossing cars off a transporter! May God help you if you're a police officer in a Michael Bay film because he has a penchant for crushing Caprices.

Credit: IMCDB.org

Movie: Beavis and Butt-Head Do America
Year: 1996
Type: 1993 (we think) Chevrolet Caprice 9C1
Role: Why do we love Mike Judge? The intricacy of the animation and the attention to detail. When Hank Hill moved up from a Ranger to an F-Series Super Duty we all noticed. And we noticed when the cops in the standoff had Caprices.

Credit: IMCDB.org

Movie: Tommy Boy
Year: 1995
Type: 1993 Chevrolet Caprice 9C1
Role: "Bees! Bees! Bees in the car! Bees everywhere! God, they're huge! They're ripping my flesh off! Run away, your firearms are useless against them!"

Credit: IMCDB.org

Movie: No Country For Old Men
Year: 2007
Type: 1990 Chevrolet Caprice
Role: One of the few films we feature using a Caprice during the early 1990s, the lighting package is ideal for a county police department in middle-of-nowhere Texas. Oh man, you don't want to know how this ends.

Credit: IMCDB.org

Movie: Black Sheep
Year: 1996
Type: 1987 Chevrolet Caprice 9C1
Role: "Well, I got a 426 hemi here, 3/4 cams, nitro boosters, I can get 'er up to as good as 155! Never do, though, of course, unless I'm chasing a cute chick in a Ferrari! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I guess I was goin' about... 65, tops." Of course, it's unlikely there is HEMI under there given it's a GM product, but who knows. Chris Farley is crazy.

Credit: IMCDB.org

Standing directly in front of Dave himself, Birkitt is seen smiling in a black shirt.

• The first apology is in in Polanski World '09. Not quite an apology actually, just a clarification. Whoopi Goldberg started out today's episode of The View by clarifying that when she said the original charge was not "rape rape" she explains, sort of, she was not attempting to brush away the charges but was making a distinction between rape and child molestation, and then she changed the subject to clear up bizarre talk that she herself had been molested.

• In perhaps the most pompous dismissal yet of these little people and their ridiculous child rape fears, legendary film critic/hero to film students everywhere, Jonathan Rosenbaum posted the following statement on his blog under the header: On the Arrest of Roman Polanski, "American lynch mobs never die; they only become more self-righteous about their savagery."

• Charter Board Member of the No Such Thing As Bad Publicity Association Brett Ratner has promptly injected himself into the melee, saying he would like to make a sequel to last year's Polanski documentary.

• In case anyone was worried that the public wouldn't have an opportunity to go over in minute detail every element of the molestation, America's media is stepping up to the plate with a refresher course. abcnews.com among others have sprung to action, satifsying the public right to know with extensive excerpts from victim Samantha Grenier's graphic 1977 grand jury testimony.

• The Polanski legal team has brought a big and well-connected gun on board: Reid Weingarten, best known as a close personal friend of Attorney General Eric Holder.

• And across the web, the outrage is boiling over towards Polanski's entertainment industry defenders.

And we've still got miles and miles to go before Roman sleeps!

The Telegraph put together a great item report on the arrest. The 76 year-old Polanski, who's been living as a French citizen, was on his way to the Zurich Film Festival, where he was supposed to receive an honorary award and be the recipient of a tribute. The charges and arrest warrant—submitted in 2005 as an international alert by request of American authorities, meaning someone, somewhere still really wanted to bust him—stem from his 1978 guilty plea to supposedly drugging and definitely having sex with a then 13 year-old Samantha Geimer, an aspiring model, during a photo shoot at Jack Nicholson's place. Of course: it's always at Jack Nicholson's place.

Polanski plead guilty, but realized the judge might not honor the plea bargain in Polanski's sentencing, and left the country. The judge in the original case—the late Laurence Rittenband—has been accused of tampering with the verdict for political reasons. Polanski's tried to appeal the decision unsuccessfully. Just two months ago, he unsuccessfully tried to get an appeals court in California to overturn a refusal to even consider throwing out his 1977 case.

He's still been making films, and won an Oscar for The Pianist in 2003 (which Frantic star Harrison Ford accepted on his behalf), but hasn't returned to the US since. He had the quite the life pre-exile: his wife, Sharon Tate, was murdered by the Manson family. He was a refugee of the Holocaust; his mother told him to run before Nazis could get to him, and she was killed in Auschwitz.

And now, Polanski's situation and life is only going to get worse for all parties involved, again. Even the adult Samantha Geimer has forgiven him, and wants the case overturned:

The victim at the centre of the case, Samantha Geimer, has previously asked for the charges to be dropped, saying the continued publication of details "causes harm to me, my husband and children.

Oh, and thanks Switzerland, for pissing off the French:

France's culture minister says he is "dumbfounded" by the arrest. of the director, who is a french citizen. Frederic Mitterrand said he "strongly regrets that a new ordeal is being inflicted on someone who has already experienced so many of them".

Silly Swiss; with your sketchy, Nazi-assisting banks and "army" knives that could maybe fight a way on the canned soup aisle, you fucked up someone's weekend. And a nice film festival! His extradition and arrest are being processed there now (both of which he can fight in Swiss courts), but at this point, he looks to be headed home.

Roman Polanski's been a cause celebre of the film community since it happened. A documentary about the issue (Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired) ran on HBO last year. The trailer's below. Polanski's very much one of the most respected, working filmmakers alive. Expect there to be a huge outpouring of support for him in Hollywood. This is far from over.

To many news outlets, the funeral and its cast of characters were breaking news. Jackson was one of the most talented, successful and media-ready celebrities ever. Every twist and turn since the singer's death has become a headline, a morsel to be devoured by an ever-hungry public. Still, tonight's script had somewhat hushed and network anchors were forced to offer tabloid details (Liz! Macaulay Culkin! Lisa Marie Prestley!) while also describing the event as "intimate." That combination, we're sure, sparked a bit of cognitive dissonance.

But clearly this mournful milestone was not simply a family affair. Yes, fans were prohibited from participating, but, in the end, only about a dozen even showed. It was the media the police had to wrangle and keep confined. Even barricaded, though, the media still received its feed from the Jackson family itself, who had set up a spot light and camera to mark the occasion. Whether it was for our benefit or theirs depends on one's perspective and levels of cynicism.

Blessedly, though, cameras were turned off for the actual funeral, during which Gladys Knight sang and Al Sharpton spoke. The spectacle that has surrounded Jackson himself, his body and his nearly ritualistic send-off has finally come to a close. The story of his death and those involved, however, will go on, and of course will not remain so respectful.

Australian tab New Weekly has a cover with the star looking like she's put on a few pounds. Given all that talk of anorexia a few years ago, you'd think that would be good, right? Wrong! The caption looks forward to the day she gets "healthy." Just last Wednesday Star also did the "Mary-Kate is fat" story, calling her weight gain shocking and saying "bye-bye billion dollar looks, hello bloat."

Star has a long history of railing on Mary-Kate's weight. It started in 2004, when they ran a cover saying she was too thin because of drugs.

They finally believed the actress' claims of anorexia in 2007 (see cover above), but did so by chastising her "stick thin legs" and wondering what is the best way to get her back to health.

Then, in 2008, they did an about face, saying she's headed back to rehab because of drinking and drugs.

There are really only six stories in a gossip glossy: diet (either too skinny or too fat), drugs, boyfriends, weddings, pregnancy and deaths. So just wait, they're soon going to say that the "bloat" is from drugs or bulimia or pregnancy or (gasp) all three! Maybe if everyone wasn't so obsessed with what she's eating, her weight would even itself out naturally. Why not go after Jonah Hill. He's overweight and probably much more in danger of a heart attack than Mary-Kate is in danger of anything other than wearing a bad outfit.