"Look, Boss!! Ze Grave! Ze Grave!"

Famed Hispanic actor Ricardo Montalban died this week. Montalban is perhaps best known for his portrayal of wishmaker Mr. Roarke on the ridiculous somebody-must-have-been-high-when-they-accepted-this ABC show "Fantasy Island." Who can forget his suave delivery: "Smiles everyone, smiles....My dear guests, I am Mr. Roarke, your host. Welcome to Fantasy Island!"

Sci-fi geeks will forever know him as the overly-chest-muscled titular villian, Khan Noonien Singh, in "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan." I don't know for sure, but I think Montalban took his last words in real life from his character: "From Hell's heart I stab at thee. For Hate's sake, I spit my last breath at thee."

Charo and Barbie Benton are scheduled to "shake it for the camera" at a memorial service this weekend. The coffin will reportedly be lined with "soft Corinthian leather."

Ricardo may help The Oracle's fantasy come true, as he makes a late-season run at the title with Ricardo's 12 points!

Six Feet Deep Throat

Linda Lovelace, a porn actress famous for her performance of deep throat fellatio in the enormously successful 1972 hardcore porn film Deep Throat, has died. Her body of work also included the 1971 bestiality flick Dog Fucker/Dogarama. Details are sketchy right now but, early indications are that...

Wait, what?

It was some old guy?

Damnit. Let's try this again.


W. Mark Felt, who to my knowledge has never appeared in a pornographic film or performed fellatio on a man, has died. The No. 2 official at the F.B.I. when he helped bring down President Nixon by resisting the Watergate cover-up, he was famously known by only the moniker "Deep Throat" to conceal his identity. The term was an allusion to the 1972 film of the same name. Which he was not in. But probably enjoyed. He was 95.

Anonymous sources clued Deady Money in on Felt's impending demise. Deady Money insists that 5 points is the national average, and not small at all.

Turning the Last Page

Bettie Page, a legendary pinup girl whose photographs in the nude, in bondage and in naughty-but-nice poses appeared in men's magazines and private stashes across America in the 1950s and set the stage for the sexual revolution of the rebellious '60s, has died. She was 85.

Morrigan attempts to tie up some of the competition by earning 15 points, hoping to pin-up the winnings when it's all over.

Dead Hand Luke

Paul Newman, the legendary movie star, irreverent cultural icon, and only successful thing to come out of Shaker Heights, Ohio, has died. He was 83.

The Oracle will probably celebrate with a light salad, some pasta, and a bowl of popcorn, and hope that the 17 points earned will, in the end, reveal the color of money.

Golden Girls Curse Kicks into High Gear

Well, I think we all saw this coming. Everyone always said the 80s sitcom The Golden Girls was cursed. And now the lead actresses are starting to--you should pardon the split infinitive--mysteriously die off.

Estelle Getty, the 84-year-old actress who played Sophia on the long-running NBC program, was the only first to die.

Rumors of a curse on the show came to the surface when the program was canceled after only its seventh season! The curse might have come because the show was shot on a sound-stage that sat atop an ancient Indian burial ground. Or maybe one of the producers opened an ancient Egyptian tomb. Both of which are pretty good explanations of where they might have found Bea Arthur.

Anyway, one Golden Girl is dead. Who will be next?

Three DW2K8ers backed the right horse (by horse, we mean Dead Golden Girl) and scored themselves a tidy 16 points.

Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot! DIE!

Picture it: Los Angeles, 2008...Lovable comedic actress Estelle Getty has passed away at the age of 84 due to some weird dementia thing that sounds made up.

Famous for her role as the elderly Sophia on the "my mom's watching it right now" series, Golden Girls, Getty was actually a year younger than the man-beast Bea Arthur, whose mother Getty portrayed. Why take Estelle from us? Why not take the mustachioed Bea Arthur instead? Bea is clearly the better choice: He's older, he's brutish, he has the grace of a woolly mammoth, and the stage presence of rancid tuna salad.

Despite being Emmy-nominated for SEVEN STRAIGHT YEARS of Best Supporting Actress/Comedy (winning once), Estelle didn't quite possess enough talent to prevent
Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot! from being one of the biggest box office and critical bombs of all time. The film received three Razzies, and even Sly Stallone called it the worst movie of his career, which is really saying something.

Morrigan, Heath Ledger's Pharmacist, and yes, Defending Champion and current leader Thanatos Therapeuticus all score a handsome 16 points from the passing of the diminutive star.

Bea Arthur has a penis.

Heavenly Clerical Error Dooms Former White House Spokesperson

Death is a high-volume business. Mistakes are gonna be made. So when Saint Peter yelled down, "We got an incoming celebrity--get me Snow! It's his time!" I immediately went and reaped the soul of the debonair former Bush White House Press Secretary TONY Snow. Sure--I was surprised that someone known for being a Bushie, subbing for Rush Limbaugh AND working for Fox News would be called up to heaven--but shit, I'm a contractor, so I just keep my head down and do my work.

Turns out, I effed it all up. I was supposed to reap the Canadian reggae artist Snow, who recorded the album "12 Inches of Snow" with the smash hit Informer back in the 90s. Whoopsie! Good thing TONY Snow has had a history of cancer, which made this an easy one to cover up, unlike that whole Kennedy mess back in the 60s.

I hope you can see my point, though--St. Pete said "celebrity," NOT "Super Notorious Outrageous Whiteboy!" Turns out JC wanted Snow to do his kid's bar mitzvah and now he's superpissed.

Because of my screw-up, Thanatos Therapeuticus will get a whopping 47 points, again enjoying the slow death of conservatives everywhere. The rest of us will have to just "a licky boom boom down," whatever the hell that means.

MC Hawking (and Mankind) Finally Gets His (Their) Wish!

Nerdcore hip-hop artist MC Hawking once 'sang,' "Why Won't Jesse Helms Just Hurry Up and Die?" Well, thankfully for Hawking and all of mankind, Helms did just that over the recent holiday weekend. Helms' "natural causes" death at age 86 was drawn out over several years, but still wasn't as painful as many had hoped. In this case, we haters will take what we can get.

Jesse Alexander Helms, Jr. was a career shitpiece, making a living being a blatantly racist and homophobic mouthpiece for an insecure and under-educated constituency. In times of trouble and controversy, Helms hid behind the robes of his imaginary friend Jesus for protection. All manner of sin is justifiable in the name of the white heterosexual Creator who made us, Helms apparently thought. While posturing as an American patriot, Helms simultaneously tried to crush the rights of minority groups of all kinds, which is why if one were to Google "WORST PEOPLE OF ALL TIME," one would find this asshole's name on the list.

Let's go through his résumé:
*Tirelessly promoted tobacco: check--OK, no big deal.
*Opposed Martin Luther King Day: check.
*Made unmistakably racist statements in public for decades: check
*Ran campaigns that basically said "vote for me if you hate blacks and gays!": CHECK
*Opposed AIDS research multiple times: check. (how else are you supposed to get rid of gays?)
*Supported racial segregation: check! those people don't actually need to live/work/eat/sleep near us, do they?
*Supported prayer in schools: you need to get your pray on--you know--to pray for strength to commit future racist acts!

For those not convinced that Jesse Helms is the unflushable log that is clogging the crapper of humanity, please consider this: Jerry Falwell liked him, and liked him enough to name Liberty University's School of Government after him. On the bright side, at least Falwell should be able to get Helms a seat for the regular Thursday night poker game with Hitler, Mao, and Waldheim.

Rock-n-Roll Suicide, Morrigan, and Deady Money will bask in the magnificence of this evil bastard's death along with social avenger and 2007 Champion Thanatos Therapeuticus. TT is living the dream, and actually making money from the deaths of the people he hates!

Bo Diddley's Death to be Ripped Off by Old White Musician

Pioneering blues musician Bo Diddley died of heart failure this week at the age of 79.

Mr. Diddley was an innovative guitar player whose style was so unique that he actually had a rhythm named after him. His Mississippi-honed rhythm guitar helped pave the way for the rise of rock and roll.

Immediately after his untimely passing, Pat Boone announced that he intended to have a stroke, followed by a heart attack, and that he would also die at 79, but that he'd make a lot more money off of it because he's more acceptable to a white audience.

The Crippler scores 21 points, thanks to Mr. Diddley.

Sydney Pollack's Death Much More Popular Than Harvey Korman's

The Shadow was deeply saddened this morning to learn of the passing of comic Harvey Korman. Korman, famous for his work on The Carol Burnett Show, as well as for his classic portrayal of Hedley Lamarr in the film Blazing Saddles, died today at age 81, from complications of an aneurysm.

But players of Deathwatch 2008 were much more concerned with the death earlier in the week of director Sydney Pollack. Pollack, the occasional actor and director of such films as They Shoot Horses, Don't They?, The Electric Horseman and Tootsie, died this week at the age of 73 from cancer.

Five--count 'em--five DW2K8ers snagged a tidy 27 points from Pollack's death, while only Kerberos anticipated the passing of Mr. Korman. Which begs the question: Why the hell were you guys so certain Pollack was about to kick it?

Not a particularly funny post, so I'll close with a joke: Why did the chicken cross the road? Apparently to attend Sydney Pollack's funeral and leave Harvey Korman's corpse to molder on the sidewalk.

You Can Go Ahead and Take Away His Gun Now

Film legend Charlton Heston died today at the age of 84.

There is a great deal of confusion as to the manner of his death. According to an A.P. report, the actor was beaten to death by a group of super-intelligent apes who had caught him in a net. Another, conflicting report, from the BBC, says that he was thrown from a chariot and died from internal injuries. The New York Times has written that Mr. Heston was smothered to death by overweight documentary film-maker Michael Moore.

All news agencies have reported the same interesting request in Heston's will, which is that he wanted to be ground up and turned into a hyper-nutritional food to end world hunger.

Deathwatchers seem to have been eagerly anticipating Heston's death, as Morrigan, Wednesday, the Grim Reaper, Kerberos, Miss of Death, Rock-n-Roll Suicide and The Oracle all snagged a tidy 16 points, leaving the rest of us tied for last.