It's almost Easter, commemorating that time when Jesus turned his bodily sacraments into colored eggs and then hid them from his disciples, the Romans got pissed off and crucified some bunnies, and God banished all makers of chocolate filled with marshmallow to Hell. Or, uh, so we've heard; we're not very religious around here. Anyway, in the spirit of the season, allow us to roll back the stone of this week for you and reveal the emptiness inside. Yea, the Friday Buzzkills have risen.
- Sorry for anyone who got their hopes up by this week's Buffy The Vampire Slayer reunion at the William S. Paley Television Festival: Joss Whedon put the kibosh on any sort of big-screen continuation by moaning, "So many stars would have to align." And by align, we'll just assume he meant "realize that they're going to star in D-grade horror films for the rest of their lives" (in Sarah Michelle Gellar's case) and "stop deteriorating before our very eyes" (in James Marsters' case). Guess you'll just have to console yourself with the comic book–we hear Buffy's a lesbian now!
- In other news that should have them rending their garments at Comic-Con: Paramount Pictures released the first-ever photos from its upcoming G.I. Joe project, which continues to push forward with production in clear defiance of our wishes. Some folks have given us flak for our premature evaluations, hopeful that the film will be something more than a cheap cash-in rendered with the same style-over-substance disposability that has turned the modern action blockbuster into such a grating experience. Allow me to direct these doe-eyed optimists to this quote from director Stephen Sommers (lest we forget, the man responsible for Van Helsing) about Ray Park's character Snake Eyes: "He's the world's greatest ninja, but he's also next-generation. He's not afraid to use a sword one second, and a split-second later he's pulling out his Glock." Awesome! Does he also "enjoy listening to gangsta hip-hop" and "partying to the extreme"?
- If only G.I. Joe were real, they would probably already be mobilizing for action after this week's threat from Fall Out Boy, who announced a sinister plan to be the first band in the Guinness Book Of World Records to play all seven continents, launching a global reign of terror that begins next week in Antarctica. There the band will play at an unspecified research facility for penguins, elephant seals, and dozens of scientists who will instantly be reminded of why they opted to go live on an ice floe at the ass-edge of the world in the first place. If nothing else, though, this little jaunt is already giving Wentz a much-needed brushing up on remedial geography: About the plan's genesis, the guylined guru said, "I was just sitting around and wrote [FOB's manager] Bob [McLynn] an e-mail saying, 'Let's be the first band to go to all five continents' – only he wrote me back, 'There are seven.'"
- Speaking of U.S. ambassadors who really shouldn't bother, Paris Hilton is currently living up to her post-prison promise to use her baffling celebrity to bring awareness to important social causes in the laziest way possible: by tagging along on a tour of boyfriend Benji Madden's band Good Charlotte, currently rocking festival dates in South Africa. Yesterday she dropped in on an orphanage in Pretoria–not particularly distressing news, except that according to reporters, "most of the more than 200 children instantly recognized the star." So Paris is more interesting than the poor starving orphans in Africa—even to the poor starving orphans in Africa?
- Continuing our discussion of dim blonde starlets who keep popping up in the news for no reason: Repeat Buzzkill offender Tori Spelling recently set herself up for even more public embarrassment by offering her services to the CW's upcoming Beverly Hills 90210 remake, telling People, "I'm obviously too young to have a teenager, so maybe I could be one of the main character's young stepmom…Playing the funny sex ed teacher at the high school would be funny, too, considering Donna Martin was America's most infamous virgin." Say, that would be funny! Hey Tori, you know what else would be funny? If you played a character with no discernible talents who subsists on her father's fortune–until one day he dies, you're cut out of his will, and you're forced to sling hash at the Peach Pit to a new cast of twentysomethings who mock you with their conventionally attractive faces and lives filled with potential. Brian Austin Green could cameo as the Sysco delivery guy!
- Maybe it's time Tori get over the fact that she's never going to be a TV star again and set her sights a little lower: Perhaps she could get a part playing the Marg Helgenberger stand-in at the new Six Flags Magic Mountain CSI: Live!, which takes all the fun of analyzing blood splatters and forensic pathology and gives it a "family friendly" twist. Parkgoers will act as witnesses, suspects, and crime investigators in the interactive stage show, hopefully the first such spin-off to come. (We can't wait for Knott's Berry Farm's Law And Order: Special Victims Unit: Why Is Snoopy So Quiet?)
- It's already been a big week for death, and just when we thought we'd make it to Saturday without having to whip up another obituary, news came in that Easy Rider producer Bill Hayward shot himself in the heart earlier this month, dying alone in his trailer. (Another tragic footnote: Hayward was the son of actress Margaret Sullavan, who died along with his sister Bridget of a drug overdose in 1960.) A sad, defeatist epilogue for a man whose defining work preached ultimate freedom (even when it devolved into self-congratulatory hippie nonsense). Here's to ya, Bill.
Have a super weekend!