So...This happened:

Apparently Rob Liefeld and Scott Snyder are having an e-pissing contest on who's the better Batman.

Bleeding Cool brings the goods.

More details courtesy of loopywafflehead. I've basically stolen all of this with her permission. Thank her for the diligent work, kids! (But just like Rob, I won't erase my mistakes I'LL JUST LEAVE THEM THERE BECAUSE PSHHHH!)


( Rob Liefeld Insults Everyone )

Small, and somewhat late, but the mousie who wrote this up for wank_report did such a good job that I thought it had to be done. One caveat, however: due to the vagaries of my internet connection, I cannot access Twitter right now, so I have no way of telling whether or not my links are working. If I've ballsed anything up, please let me know and I will try to fix as soon as I can. Anyroad:

Listen and attend, o my beloved. Once upon a time in a town called Melbourne, just north of Antarctica, there was a newspaper called The Age. And in The Age lived a happy little film critic called Jim Schembri. Lots of people hated him because of his unremitting dislike of Australian films - one film maker famously said "Fuck you, Jim Schembri!" as he accepted an Australian Film Institute award. Schembri once wrote a stingingly accurate satire on bloggers that I post here to demonstrate his acute grasp of new media.

But that doesn't matter right now. Suffice to say, the man has form.

The latest turn in the Schembri saga began when he spoiled the ending of Scream4 in the first sentence of a review that appeared online on the Fairfax news site for around 24 hours, and consequently spent a few hours at the top of the Rotten Tomatoes website. This, predictably enough, caused some online unrest, with upset tweeters saying things like "Douchebag! You spoiled the film!" etcetera. So the review's wording was slightly changed the following day so that the spoiler was not so evident. Fair enough. A mistake was made and rectified. But - and this is where the wank begins - some special internet magic happened.

It turned out that THERE HAD NEVER BEEN A SPOILER. Jim Schembri has a twitter account, notable for the fact that under his "following" tab is the number 0. Yes, he follows absolutely no one. And he posted a tweet which said that those who had seen the spoiler were hallucinating, or something.

Clearly, an Age critic is NEVER WRONG.

In brief: the story continues here and here, as picked up by fellow critic Luke Buckmaster.

But then came the truly bizarre twist: a crazy flurry of tweets in which Schembri started going on (and on) about a time machine - and making a mock, or so he thought, of Luke Buckmaster.

Buckmaster updates the story on his blog.

Much hilarity ensues on twitter, especially as Jim signs his tweets with his own name. But then...

He follows up with a series of breathless tweets promising the TRUE STORY of the Twitter outrage!

And lo and behold, my beloved, in today's Age the explanation is unfolded in its full glory. It was a social experiment! He planned it all along! Jim Schembri "punk'd the Twitterverse!" He's just like Noam Chomsky!

[Editor's note: A hint, dear critic: no-one, but no-one, is like Noam Chomsky. Possibly not even Noam Chomsky is like Noam Chomsky.]

The "twitterverse", naturally, is less than impressed, but highly amused to have its low expectations so richly rewarded. Also puzzled that a once respected Melbourne broadsheet daily is prepared to publish such drivel. How the mighty have fallen.

The moral of the story, children, is simple. See how much more work you make for yourself when you can't 'fess up to a simple mistake? How many keystrokes you waste? How the Will o'the Wisp of Vanity leads you ever deeper into the Swamps of Delusion and Stupid?

Bonus: Max Lavergne on That Time Machine.

Also, Schembri's twitter account

Well, all right, maybe not high speed car chases. So, the background: last year, Neil Gaiman, author of such lovely things as Neverwhere and the Sandman series etc., was contacted to speak at a library in Minnesota for a hefty speaking fee, which was paid for by a fund which (a) stated any leftover money would be lost if not used, and (b) was also not available for books, salaries, or other useful things. Neil Gaiman did so, and subsequently donated the speaking fee to charities.

All's well that ends well, right? Well, except that Matt Dean, the House Majority Leader, decided it was time to let his long-simmering grudge be aired to the world: 'Dean said that Gaiman, "who I hate," was a "pencil-necked little weasel who stole $45,000 from the state of Minnesota."'

Neil is... well, he's not well pleased. Nor is his Twitter. ( Cut for length )

Almost entirely copied-and-pasted from (I assume) several mousies over on wank_report! Thank you, mousies. *leaves cheese* Apologies in advance for any cock-ups on my part - I'm posting this to distract myself from the extreme pain currently emanating from my uterus.

Nicole Crowther (she tweets under her real name, which will be important later) is an extra on the Glee set and has been feeding the fandom spoilers on Twitter for months now. Today she decided to tweet a major plot twist for the upcoming prom episode (seriously, don't follow that link if you care at all about spoilers).

Glee fandom, a powderkeg at the best of times, predictably explodes (apparently there was a much wankier post on kurt_blaine that got deleted, which I sadly missed because I was out having lunch :( ). People speculate that her Twitter may have been hacked, or that she might be drunk. At least... Up until the spoiler is confirmed by a different extra who has been feeding the fandom spoilers (but who DOESN'T post under her real name).

There is much wailing and gnashing of teeth and rending of garments (basically just another day in Glee fandom), right up until Brad Falchuk (one of the showrunners/writers) tweets at Nicole:

@nicolecrowther hope you're qualified to do something besides work in entertainment.
@nicolecrowther Who are you to spoil something talented people have spent months to create?

Well, shit.

On the other hand, the showrunners and actors have something of a history of lying to/trolling their fanbase, so some fans are still suspicious.

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE:

Seems an extremely invested fan actually called the Paramount Studio to report Nicole's transgression and thus get her fired.

Mousey/ies over on Wank Report have more: apparently Nicole apologised to Brad before deleting her Twitter, but not before being sure to flail about whining at the internetz bullies and to present us with the following classic:

@NicoleCrowther: I don't want to be an extra anymore that's why I said what I said. Haters need to back off, you're not cool or funny. Get a life.

Because obviously, the best way to quit your job on one of the most successful programmes of the moment is to break your non-disclosure agreement... Although if Gawker is to be believed, she's got her wish.

And to think, there's still at least a month until this episode airs!

ETA: SPOILERS NOW IN COMMENTS. Don't blame me, blame the C&P-er...

ETA II: Again, from a mouse on wank_report ... shit's really going down!

Turns out, Nicole Crowther was fired from the Glee set last year for inappropriate behaviour, and it looks as though she's been pretending to be an extra on set for months in order to give out spoilers. The initial article suggests that there's now a possibility that all the regular extras on Glee could be fired and blackballed if her sources don't give themselves up, although that seems somewhat ... extreme?

ONTD_Glee reacts pretty much as you might expect, and some more info here and here.