Last Wednesday, we momentarily paused from the unrelenting gloom of our StrikeWatching activities to sneak in a smile at the goat-despoiling adventures promised by an ad for Kill Buljo, a Norwegian import in which a katana-wielding, Boratesque protagonist embarks on a Kill Bill-inspired quest for revenge upon the fiends who slaughtered his family. Today, we again briefly pause from our unhealthy immersion in the ongoing labor strife to share the film's dubbed, English-language trailer; while we were disappointed there's no cameo by the cloven-hoofed object of Buljo's affections, it does feature a poignant reaction shot of a startled cow (and a mysterious flash of a pelvic thrust), happily suggesting that our hero's appetite for ruminant-buggery might extend to comely members of the bovine family.

At least one hard-to-please critic at Paramount feels let down by the WGA picketers' early attempts at creating some megaphone-enhanced excitement within the non-striking population at the Melrose lot: "The chanting has begun. It's already getting old. I love a good strike as much as the next person but you would think writers could come up with better chants than the standard "What do we want?... When do we want it?.." Lame."

Should we be surprised that the largest visual Beowulf marketing placement in Tinseltown is a customized gift-wrap of the Public Storage facility squatting at the corner of Santa Monica and Highland? Nay! The well-researched placement is simply Paramount's attempt to sequester a share of the eyeballs normally reserved for Apple's longstanding "We are fucking huge, and we are here to stay" tribute to dancing and antisocial behavior directly across the street.

The Smoking Gun, your one-stop celebrity mugshot superstore, has come through once again, being first up with Shia LaBeouf's post-Walgreens incident booking photo. Our first reaction was one of concern—did the abandonment of his signature Guido hairstyle suggest he'd ceased to care about even the most basic grooming rituals? Upon further reflection, however, we concluded the actor's sly grin suggested less a flippancy regarding Chicago drunken-pharmacy-lingering laws, but rather a genuine giddiness over his newly sprouted facial hair. Shia'll be just fine. [TSG]

· Hollywood Out of Ideas, Revenge Is A Dish Best Served Reheated Edition: Sylvester Stallone is in talks to direct and star in an MGM remake of Charles Bronson's 1974 vigilante-justice classic, Death Wish. Stallone's reimagined version, however, will focus on an aging action star who seeks bloody retribution against studio executives who've collectively decided he's too old to carry an original feature. [Variety]
· Spotted on the all-star WGA picket line in front of NBC's Rockefeller Center headquarters: 30 Rock's Tina Fey, SNL's Seth Meyers, and The Daily Show's John Oliver. [THR]
· Meanwhile, Meyers and Fey's NBC writer/performer peers from The Office have been ordered to show up at work to perform their acting duties during the strike. [Variety]

The image of the male conjurer has always been steeped so heavily in an aura of lady-loving machismo—from David Copperfield's babe-netting trapdoor audience seating to the Pam-Anderson-bazoom-levitating prestidigitation of Hans Klok—that when J.K. Rowling revealed Prof. Albus Dumbledore to enjoy the, ahem, company of other wizards, even those of us with the most finely attuned Gay-Wizardar failed to see it coming.

We never expected the strike to yield its first casualty so quickly, but according to local news station KABC 7, a picketer was struck earlier this morning by a driver we'll have to assume wasn't particularly sympathetic to the Writers Guild cause. ("The guy basically said, 'Get the 'F' out of the way, and then hit the gas and just plowed into this guy," said an eyewitness to the incident.) The above footage from KABC's segment doesn't contain video of the incident, but does have a fairly unsettling image of the victim's sneaker lodged beneath the tire of the vehicular strike-breaking weapon. Beware, WGA members: it seems that not everyone is following the nonconfrontational approach to dealing with picketers urged by some of the Companies.

While we eagerly await reports from the studio front lines about the first picketing writer to throw himself upon the hood of an executive's Lexus SUV and chant Guild-approved slogans until his grip on the vehicle's windshield wipers is pried loose by lot security, we pass along Portfolio's early story of strike-related heroism, which claims that Jon Stewart, in another show of appreciation for the "words" his writing staff provides him every day, will reach into his own pockets to try to ameliorate the suffering his Daily Show and Colbert Report compatriots during the walkout:

The world may see a dreamy-eyed fantasy boyfriend, but all Jake Gyllenhaal sees when he looks into the mirror is a four-eyed, fat-waisted controller of tartar: "When I was a kid I had these huge glasses. I once went to a costume party as a Crest tooth paste tube with these huge glasses stuck on. That is how I see myself most of the time. A Crest toothpaste tube with bad eyesight." [Page Six]

Such is the price of Biggest Movie Star in the World fame: When any of us mortals get blitzed over the weekend, then develop a sudden hankering for 50%-off Halloween candy, refusing to leave a nearby pharmacy until an employee submits to our drunken requests to check the store room for any stray bags of bite-sized Whatchamacallits (a confectionary stand-off that results in an arrest on misdemeanor trespassing charges), the shameful tale never extends much further than our immediate circle of hyperventilating-with-laughter friends. In Shia LaBeouf's case, however, a similar scenario will instantly make worldwide headline news:

People showing up to work at the Fox lot this morning received this cheery memo from the Executive Vice President of Production, helpfully reminding employees that they should be making "appropriate arrangements" (i.e., plans for a career change, the selling of personal effects/internal organs for rent/mortgage money) in the event that the company decides to discontinue their employment during the strike: "The production you are working on may come to completion, or because your particular skills may no longer be needed, you may not be picked up for another week or day (whichever is applicable) under your deal memo (if applicable). Therefore your work on the production may come to an end. Although we are not required by law to provide this notice, we wanted to give you as much notice as possible so that you can make appropriate arrangements."

By the time you read these words, the striking members of the WGA will have already taken their positions at the entrances of every studio lot in the city, hoping that the inspiring sight of scores of red-shirted, spindly armed picketers (unless some Teamsters decided to join the first-day mix and add some muscle to the walkout) toting eye-catching signs will inspire at least a view of their peers to turn their cars around and head home in solidarity. We begin, as has been our custom, with a round-up of strikes news, leading off with the dueling™ WGA and AMPTP statements explaining why yesterday's last-minute talks ended in not-unexpected failure:

On this gloomy Monday morning, take a moment to review the weekend's studio strike fund box office results, allowing yourself to momentarily ignore the coordinated chants of the picketers outside your place of employment.

· 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0. (Kaboom.)
· The Zombie labor talks, meanwhile, prove no more successful.
· Jerry Seinfeld demonstrates the downside of having way too much fuck-you money.
· Even sad Hollywood Blvd. Superman thinks "Blackout" is off-the-hizzle!
· Next time, you may want to put some product in that, Mein Herr.
· The Curse of the Swarovski-Encrusted Skull claims another victim.
· Britney Spears tops the charts and crushes a cop's foot.
· In the end, Dog the Bounty Hunter would only be done in by his n-word-loving self.
· Lane Garrison gets 40 months.
· The lesser Grazer makes good.
· Katie Holmes feigns lifelike behavior in movie trailer.
· NBC's The Office/The Other Office two-hour programming block is self-cannibalized comedy night done right!
· Defamer can't stop partying: The Guitar Hero III launch, Family Guy's 100th episode, and Mr. T's Bowl.
· And, finally, a farewell to Goulets.

· Just when we thought there was nothing that could possibly make us smile on this long, depressing day, we flipped back through our copy of Digital Variety, finding Go Fast. For the moment, at least, everything seems right with the world.
· Speaking Truth to Senile Power Dept: You know who isn't especially charmed by Larry King's patented "zero research" interviewing technique? Jerry Seinfeld. Don't you know who he is, Larry? 75 million fucking viewers, Larry!
· EW.com's readers may not realize that the term "of all time" includes the period before Prison Break debuted.
· One clear beneficiary of the writers strike: NaNoWriMo.
· We know we've already been there once this week, but now, more than ever, we think we need a little unicorn magic in our lives.

In this latest installment of Defamer Overheard Movie Reviews, an operative lets us know that the man who directed Spinal Tap, A Few Good Men and The Princess Bride—but much more recently Rumor Has It, The Story of Us and Alex & Emma—seems pretty difficult to please: "Just got out of the 12:00 showing of American Gangster at the Avco on Wilshire in Westwood along with The Bucket List director Rob Reiner, who, while exiting, remarked of the film, 'In terms of The Godfather, it doesn't come close.'" Of course, the unheard snippet of conversation immediately following might have been, "But it totally blows away Virtuosity, which I've always maintained was prettty fucking sweet," providing a little more context for Reiner's absurdly high cinematic standards.

Friday
· Music round-up: Polyphonic Spree at Henry Fonda, Yo La Tengo at Ivar, Low Vs. Diamond at the Viper Room.
· Join Dunder Mifflin's five-o'clock-shadowed upper-management as B.J. Novak takes to the Hollywood Improv stage.
· AFI Fest continues with a screening of Sigur Ros - Heima, a documentary of the Icelandic band's recent tour of their homeland.

A commenter on our earlier post about David Letterman's writers strike segment on last night's episode of The Late Show recommended that we go back to check out Jon Stewart's comments on the same topic on The Daily Show (the program we're going to miss most of all), in which he let viewers know that they could watch reruns during any strike-related hiatus for free on their fancy new website, a gift made possible by the generosity of advertisers unafraid to throw their money away on a medium likely never to generate enough profits to share with the employees who come up with all those "words" he's fond of reading. We followed the reader's helpful advice and found the clip. Enjoy.

As expected, the WGA took the enthusiastic shouts of the 3,000 or so writers who showed up last night's meeting as a sign that now would be a pretty good time for a walkout, officially announcing moments ago that the picket-line-walking and slogan-singalong fun will begin Monday at the gates of every studio in town. The LAT has the e-mail that went out to the membership:

Now that the studios and networks have an official start date for the strike, executives looking to beat the scab-staffing rush can get a jump-start on their creative needs by hitting Craigslist, online home to the town's most eager, brightest nonunion talent: Scab for Hire Email me Monday when you're employees walk out. I have a degree in Journalism and Philosophy. I work super cheap as my experience is low. I'll write/re-write anything, for art's sake or money's. [Craigslist]