the early-evening news

Buffy Is an Open-minded, Modern Kind of Vampire Slayer

Courtesy of Dark Horse

Buffy Goes Sorta Gay: In this week’s issue of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season Eight, Buffy winds up in bed with a female fellow slayer. We trust Joss Whedon will handle this in an interesting, nonexploitative fashion, and we trust the New York Times will expend their bimonthly comics coverage on the development. Oh, look! [NYT]

World Saved: With New Line being folded into Warner Bros., no one knows which green-lit projects might get killed. But there’s good news! Brett Ratner’s Mr. S, in which Chris Tucker plays Frank Sinatra’s limo driver, will probably be one of them. [LAT]

Lil Jon Goes Classy: Prefer your Crunk Juice a little more upscale? Lil Jon is opening the (no lie) Little Jonathan Winery, selling Chardonnay, Merlot, and Cab Sauv. Yeaaaah! [AdAge]

Avril Brings Ersatz Punk to Kohl’s: In other hilarious brand-extension news, Avril Lavigne is creating a juniors line for Kohl’s, a.k.a. the store where our mom used to buy all our school clothes. Adding fingerless gloves to the manga she already pushes means Avril is frighteningly in touch with the disillusioned 12-year-old demographic. [Cut]

Downey in Blackface: “If you don’t do it right, we’re going to hell,” says Robert Downey Jr. about his role in Ben Stiller’s comedy Tropic Thunder: a white actor so devoted to his craft that in order to play a character originally written as black, he performs in blackface. Even if they do do it right, we imagine we’ll go to hell for watching it. [EW]

Alex Keaton Faces the Present: Gary David Goldberg: Alex P. Keaton would vote for Obama. Michael J. Fox: Alex P. Keaton would be a felon. [Campaign Stops/NYT]

Buffy Is an Open-minded, Modern Kind of Vampire Slayer