Zadie Smith has thoughts - lots of thoughts - on Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook. Most of them are negative - but also well thought-out, nuanced, and quite persuasive.

It's hard to know exactly where to start in our Badass chronicles. As it only natural, Putin came along to remind us exactly what a badass looks like. In Foreign Policy's slide show about how Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin spent their summer vacations, Putin does plenty of badass things: ride a motorcycle, fly a helicopter, visit a new mother in the hospital (badassedly, of course). But this image takes the cake:

You need no further explanation than the one FP's already got on tap: Putin stares down a bear. He's staring down a damn bear because, hey, bears should be afraid of Putin people. I submit to you Vladimir Putin, Badass for Life.

Because three vampire posts in a row are better than two, let's all take a moment to admire Rolling Stone's True Blood cover for their September issue, shall we?

The only question is, will this implied threeway come to pass on the show? Okay, there are other questions like, "If Alexander Skarsgaard doesn't wear a sock, why does Stephen?" and "How do I get the job standing around splashing these guys with more blood?" and "How many sit ups went into this shoot?" There just aren't any other relevant  questions.

Yesterday, I read in read in the Vulture that Jay Baruchel “broke ranks” with the “Apatow crew’s unofficial policy of avoiding well-paying blockbuster crap” to make The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, meaning that should he be smarting from the “commercial and critical drubbing” that movie’s received, he really brought it on himself. This article is merely a trifle, not meant to be taken über-seriously (we don’t even know that he is smarting), but it’s unfortunately exactly the type of trifle that puts a bee in my bonnet. To wit: is Jay Baruchel even that big a part of the house that Apatow built?

Yes, he starred in Undeclared, which the Vulture is correct in reminding you is “so, so good.” Bear in mind that Judd Apatow, for all we credit him for, has written and directed exactly three movies: The 40 Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up, and Funny People. Of those, Baruchel has starred or co-starred in exactly zero. He’s a supporting player in Knocked Up. The article quotes Seth Rogen and Jonah Hill repeatedly. Rogen was a supporting player in Virgin, the star of Knocked Up, and the co-star of Funny People. Hill appeared in Knocked Up and Funny People and co-starred in the Apatow-produced Superbad and Get Him to the Greek. Of all the other Apatow-produced (and therefore, one assumes, approved) movies, Baruchel has appeared in none. Heck, his Undeclared love interest Carla Gallo has appeared in more Apatow movies.

In Canadian pop culture (particularly on the English-speaking side), we have this idea that you haven’t made it here until you’ve made if there (in the U.S.). Despite his comic talent and not inconsiderable charm, Baruchel hasn’t made it there in the way that fellow Canadian and ur-Apatow-ian Rogen or even Hill has. Instead, he’s carved out his own path in Canadian fare like Just Buried, The Trotsky, and the upcoming Good Neighbours. Not exactly the stuff of Apatow. This is not to say that he won’t in the future, just that for whatever reason he hasn’t played as big a role as the Vulture’s headline would have you believe. At the end of the article they offer up the “unlikely possibility” that Baruchel “genuinely thought The Sorcerer’s Apprentice would be good,” but that would have been my first guess. Who doesn’t want to make a movie with Nicholas Cage? If I got a call right now to appear in Ghost Rider 2, I’d be there.

In what sounds like yet another made-up-by-the-media trend, all of one teen is claiming to be involved in biting and blood exchanges to demonstrate romantic passion and intimate friendship. While the doc quoted has legit concerns about infections, let me tell you why this is preposterous:

• This is the exact kind of shit that freaks teens out, which is why vampires work so well as a metaphor for sex.
• Vamps and their human lovers don't bite each other in Twilight. Humans aren't physically able to break through vampire skin. Vamp bites mean death or vampirism. Which brings us back to human-on-human action, and that is strictly prohibited in Twilight.
• The Vampire Diaries and True Blood do feature blood exchanges, but it's really only kinky sex stuff in True Blood. And while teens no doubt watch True Blood, they, too, would be freaked out by the INSANE sex scenes. Which means that they wouldn't want to do that kind of stuff because it is too freaky.

Ergo, the entire thing is too freaky, even for freaky teens. One high school does not a trend make.

Fourth of July means no True Blood recap, but thankfully there's other crazy vampire news: the Vulture is reporting that Robert Pattinson, Kristen Stewart, and Taylor Lautner will receive an obscene $25 million for Breaking Dawn and Breaking Dawn 2: Demon Baby Boogaloo against a 7.5% cut of theatrical gross.

Remember when Jim Carrey earned a then-unheard of $20 million for The Cable Guy (a notorious flop deserving of a cult revival)? Nowadays, you'd be hard pressed to think of a recent worthwhile Carrey vehicle (that will likely change if I Love You Philip Morris ever gets a release date in Canada and the U.S.), and you could be forgiven if your mind temporarily fritzed at the mention of his name. I can't decide what's more bizarre: how little obscene paychecks have gone up in the last 14 years or the possibility that one of these three is the next Jim Carrey. One of them is the way to making The Truman Show, another to The Number 23. Quick! Guess which is which!

Adding to our list of specious shout outs is Rolling Stone's story that got General McChrystal fired. "The Runaway General"? Meet the Runaway issue.

Even though Fridays make everyone happy because it's finally the end of the week, they can also be totally depressing because 1) you still have to make 'til the end of the work day and 2) it's the end of the week. That's okay, friends. I have two pieces of news that ought to bring you cheer.

1. Sticky
   There is a Canadian goose evading the capture attempts of park authorities in Prospect Park, NYC. Why are they trying to capture Sticky? Because he's got an arrow through his neck. He has had for three weeks now. Apparently an arrow through the neck is no big deal to Sticky, who keeps on running, flying, and swimming away. That's some serious badassery, Sticky. No wonder we love those geese.
2. Tim Riggins and Eric Northman, Two Great Tastes That Taste Great Together
   Yes, there is going to be a movie based on Battleship, the board game, and that's a real shame. But it stars Taylor Kitsch (a.k.a Tim Riggins) and Alexander Skarsgård (a.k.a. Eric Northman), so how bad could it be, really? Just so you understand, we're talking about these guys:
   

 

 

As mentioned before, Ayaan Hirsi Ali will be in Ottawa on June 10, as part of the Ottawa International Writers Festival. The event coincides with the publication of her third book, "Nomad," which is primarily a charting of her alienation from the Muslim faith she grew up in. The Globe and Mail's reviewer, Theodore Dalrymple, is, on the whole, very positive and notes that she states her case "with both modesty and great eloquence." His sole caveat is that "the Enlightenment ideal that she espouses is rather too simple as an answer to the problems of human existence."

The latest issue of Brick magazine contains a series of three essays on the passing of Allan King, the versatile Canadian filmmaker most known for his powerful documentaries on social issues such as race, poverty, domestic abuse, and death. (Here is an insightful youtube clip incorporating an interview with King and footage from some of his films. It also has Orson Welles, smoking a cigar and saying that movie directing is "the only profession in the world where you can be incompetent and go on being successful for thirty years with nobody ever discovering.")

And Prairie Fire magazine contains an interview with Austin Clarke, the author of the Giller Prize-winning The Polished Hoe, in which he discusses race, immigration, and the concept of "home."

I get that it's the last season and all, but moving Supernatural to Fridays at 9 p.m.? After the apparently immortal Smallville? When a show's so bad that even I stop watching it, how bad do you think it must be? The Vampire Diaries followed by Supernatural was one of the most perfect fits ever seen on that network. The WB once paired Buffy the Vampire Slayer with 7th Heaven, for pity's sake.

Also, there is no point in yet another Nikita since this one is unlikely to star Roy Dupuis, famous Canadian hottie actor.

Gossip Girl remains as it was, so at least we can comfort ourselves with that.

In yet more not-coming-t0-Ottawa news, add TwiCon to the list. In fact, TwiCon has ceased operations and did so in March (where was I? Oh, how your ace vampire reporter has let you down). Quelle disappointment, you guys. I was really planning to rock that thing, press-style. In the meantime, read Bite Me: A Love Story, celebrate the fact that Kellan Lutz and Ashley Greene have finally signed for Breaking Dawn, and check out this vamp army shot from Eclipse:

Just showing the vamp army puts the movie head and shoulders above the book, right?

The New Quarterly's latest issue -- No. 114, "To List is Human" -- is guest edited by Diane Schoemperlen, and contains, among other things, a charming story by Julie Paul, "The Black Forest."

The esteemed New Brunswick journal The Fiddlehead celebrates its 65th anniversary with stories by Deborah-Anne Tunney and Julie Curwin, and poems by Emily Carr and charles c. smith.

And finally, a note on Yann Martel's Beatrice and Virgil, which, while it was lauded in the Globe and Mail as "ingenious," the New Yorker has, in a mini-review, derided Martel for making "a series of baffling choices" in his attempt to create thoughtful art out of the Holocaust. Sounds like the only way to decide which one is more accurate is to read it yourself.

Michael Ausiello's reporting that Lara Pulver has been cast as Sookie's fairy godmother Claudine. For those who've watched the pilot and wondered what happened to Sookie's telekinesis since then, it was Claudine who tightened the chain around Matt Rattray's neck when Sookie rescued Bill. Claudine was later cut from the pilot/show. I'm not sure what the story is supposed to be, but there were clues last season that there's something more to Sookie than just telepathy. Maybe Claudine is that something more. Eric will be so confused!

Word is that director/brother-in-law Casey Affleck is looking for buyers for the possibly-but-unlikely-to-be real Joaquin Phoenix documentary about Phoenix's transition from actor to hip hop musician or some such. I am beyond trying to figure this cat out. I'm sure the movie will explain everything, but what explanation would we really want to hear, anyway?

"It's real." Okay, then record something.  Commit to the music.

"It's fake." Psych? Thanks for wasting our time, but Robert Downey Jr.'s our movie boyfriend now, so what are you going to do?

It's pretty well established at this point that Putin is one scary motherfucker. Not only that, but he seems to have some sort of deep seated inferiority complex that results in his "anything you can do, I can do better" shenanbons. This week Foreign Policy posted a neat little guide to five world leaders' phobias (apparently Dubya is afraid of horses). Putin, natch, is not among them. Instead, the Putin tidbit appears on Angela Merkel's slide. Merkel was bitten by a dog as a small child and naturally developed a phobia as a result of the trauma. And how sensitive is Putin? This sensitive:

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, a master of psychological diplomacy, has repeatedly attempted to take advantage of Merkel's fear. In 2006, the then-president perplexed German diplomats by presenting the chancellor with a small dog as a gift and made a habit of having his black Labrador, Koni, sit in on their meetings.

Is he really that threatened by Merkel or is he just that big a dick? You decide.

I read "Work That Plays," a National Post story about Broken City Lab's attempts to revitalize Windsor through the arts, earlier this week, but it wasn't until today that this section fully registered: 

In one project called Rewriting Windsor, citizens came together over a number of evenings and contributed to a multimedia history of the city that included video, audio, text and visual art. The result was a collaborative and imagined history of the city written by the community. 

So, they recreated the last 20 minutes or so of Be Kind Rewind? Alright then. It is a pretty sweet movie. But Justin Langlois should probably send writer-director-media-artist-in-his-own-right Michel Gondry a thank you note.

Friends, there are movies (movies! plural!) to be seen this weekend. Let's get to it.

New on the Hollywood front, you've got The Ghost Writer, starring Pierce Brosnan as a Blair-esque former British PM who led the country into an undesirable war and noted feminist Ewan McGregor as the ghost writer tasked with completing the PM's memoirs. You've got Repo Men, in which Jude Law and Forest Whitakre reposse people's purchased organs for Liev Schrieber. You've got Diary of a Wimpy Kid, about, um, a wimpy kid in middle school and his over-sized delusions  of grandeur. Finally, if you've got any desire to go see The Bounty Hunter, let Tony Scott cure you.

Over at the Bytowne, you've got Colin Firth's heartbreaking performance in A Single Man, Xavier Dolan's heartbreaking debut J'ai tué ma mère, Darwin biopic Creation, and Fellini-inspired fiasco Nine.

Despite previous reports, Jake Gyllenhaal will not be filming scenes for the upcoming thriller Source Code. VIA Rail couldn't come to terms for their fee with the producers, so Ottawa will miss out on as much as $200,000 injected into the local economy. Also, we'll miss out on Jake Gyllenhaal. Thanks, VIA. If you can't get the trains to run on time, you could at least expose us to a hottie or two (co-star Vera Farmiga).

I'd try come up with something more erudite than that, something with trenchant insight into Mad Men as cultural phenomenon, the commodification of culture, or the final sell-out straw, but who are we kidding? I own a Dylan McKay Barbie and proudly take him out in public. I so want Mad Men Barbies. Or I would if they weren't $300 US collector's items. Also, that's a really poor Don. I mean, my Dylan McKay Barbie really looks like Dylan McKay. They put some serious effort into that nine-head. These things are generic-looking.  I still kind of want the Roger one though I will hold out hope that someone one day makes a Roger string-pulley doll since Roger has all the best lines.

Wait, is there an Sterling Cooper Barbie-office for sale as well? That would be sweet.

The New York Post's NYPD March 3 blotter includes the following little gem:

Brooklyn

He just wigged out.