Fug Madness

Oh, joyous day. Could March BE any more delightful? March Madness, St Patrick's Day, Daylight Savings, Bubble Gum Week, National Pig Day, Dr Seuss's birthday, Potato Chip Day (tragic, as I gave potatoes up for Lent), Big Bird's birthday, the anniversary of the invention of Coca Cola (leading, eventually, to our sweet Diet Coke), National toast day (the bread, rather than the alcohol-fueled exchange of cheer), and now the return of Fug Madness. We are so excited (so excited, so scared).

To sum it up briefly for those of you who weren't around last year: over the next two days, we'll be revealing the 65 poorly-dressed celebrity nutjobs who will be battling it out, NCAA basketball tournament style, to determine who is the fugliest of them all. (If you want a refresher of how last year's tournament went, click here and relive the magic.)

Today, we'll be revealing the stars who will be competing in the Bjork and Cher brackets. Tomorrow, you'll learn who has made it to the Charo and Madonna brackets. Monday, we'll have a full, printable bracket available for your pleasure, and voting with extreme prejudice begins Tuesday. But we couldn't resist giving you a spoiler, and so, without further ado, we present your four number one seeds - the four crazy (and, in one case, crazy delicious) celebrities we think will be the hardest to beat. They are:

Aubrey O'Day
Solange
Mischa Barton
And the one, the only: SWINTON

Stay tuned!

After roughly 1.1 million total votes throughout the ten days of Fug Madness, we finally have a champion.

There were upsets (who knew Brittany Murphy had legs in this thing?), there were Cinderellas (sweet Peldon, if anyone is likely to take that as a cue to wear actual glass slippers around town, it's you), and there was agita and tears and regret from all the supporters of favorite fuggers who fell victim to our eventual finalists. Tough to say if it's heartening or tragic for Chloe Sevigny that her supporters were so vocal in bemoaning her absence from the final game; her fair-and-square loss in the Elite Eight proves that, just as in basketball, what you've achieved before doesn't matter if you don't bring it on the day. Remember her fate this time next year, Chloephiles -- your votes do count.

And yesterday, 69 percent of them counted in favor of our first-ever Fug Madness champion. From the brutal Charo bracket, past challengers like Tara Reid and Sevigny, Phoebe Price and Mary-Kate Olsen, comes your glorious champion --our very own version of the four horsemen of the apocalypse but with about 24 personalities instead of four steeds.

Yes: BAI LING.

[Photo: Splash News]

Whether you are crying over spilled Sevigny or had your money on Sharon Stone, at the end of the day, it's impossible to deny that the title sits well on Bai's semi-nude shoulders. Her fug reigns supreme because it is supreme; she certainly worked hard for it, and worked it hard. The best part is how she's standing there all defiant, like, "What, lensmonkey? Are you not used to lace bodystockings and turbans? Well, when Madonna is elected president in 2020 and this becomes our National Guard uniform, you will not be so SMIRKY, you sad shutter-clown."

Well, except, it's Bai Ling,  so that would come out sounding more like, "Loving darling, I am moving through light in the haze of......what? Dancing with sweat to celebrate, all hail, and salute the singing future of clouds. Do you fallow me? HELLO!"

Congratulations to her, and to runner-up Victoria Beckham, who scored the unlikely upset of a devastatingly strong and Peldon-killing Sharon Stone. You all fugged hard, and we look forward to what you can achieve in a comeback campaign in Fug Madness 2009.

And for those of our readers who love an incredibly cheesy (and slightly grainy) post-tournament tribute reel, we've prepared a video treat, replete with all the intentionally  ridiculous special-effects we can muster on a dime budget:

We can hardly believe this final game is here! And what a game it is: a beloved, nearly always semi-naked, multiple-personalitied  performer/blogger of great awesomeness  versus an erstwhile Spice Girl and lover of Beckham, spray tans, high heels, sunglasses and overall ferociousness.

(2) BAI LING vs. (1) VICTORIA "POSH SPICE" BECKHAM

Oh, BAI. Your archive gives us such great joy. Who can forgot this triad of deliciousness? Who can remain hard-hearted when faced with visual evidence of a great love affair with a Chewbacca in high-water pants? Who can look upon this and not feel certain that all is right in the world of fug?

That is what Rock of Love With Bret Michaels would wear if it woke up and realized it was actually a person rather than a television show. This is also rather fetching:

It's been nine days of matches and more than one million votes -- be kind to your tired mouse-clicking fingers this weekend -- and now, we're down to two brackets, two contestants. Bjork flew home, tragically not actually taking the real Paris Hilton with her; if Cher could turn back time, if she could find a way, she'd make all her friends vote for Sharon so she'd stay.

But it's too late. The votes are in, and your final game is:

(2) BAI LING vs. (1) VICTORIA "POSH SPICE" BECKHAM

Bai captured the Charo bracket and then trampled over Paris Hilton with 73 percent of the vote, knocking the Bjork bracket into the next galaxy and putting her one game closer to winning this whole thing. Posh knocked back an impressive challenger in Sharon Stone, notching 52 percent of your support -- a majority almost as slim as she is.

We've had so much fun watching this shake down; thanks for all your votes -- a million of them equals a LOT of fugpinions -- and for keeping the comments so amusing and on-topic and smart.

The final game tips off on Monday morning. Bring beer.

(3) PARIS HILTON vs. (2) BAI LING

As we've mentioned before, it seems unseemly to credit Paris Hilton with winning anything, so let's just say that she is the only one who snuck out of Bjork's intrabracketary spaceship before it took off again for the home planet.

In a way, though, it's fitting that Paris and Bai should meet up at such a pivotal stage: Both attempt to act every now and then, both are fond of dressing for what we will politely call "maximum impact," both are best known for something unrelated to having an actual skill, and  both have tried singing (Paris on her album; Bai on VH-1's But Can They Sing?; if you have our book, you know there is a photo of her from this performing in nothing but a rhinestone bikini).

They're also both deranged:

And you know what else? They're both DERANGED:

(2) SHARON "RAPID BEAVER" STONE vs (1) VICTORIA "POSH SPICE" BECKHAM

The final four! It's here at last! It's almost time to cue "One Shining Moment" over a touching montage of, like, Courtney Peldon kicking Lohan in the nads or Tilda Swinton and K-Fed sharing a tender-yet-creepy post-game embrace.

As for this particular game, we must be frank: we love these two. If they were to start showing up places looking even vaguely normal on a regular basis, we would be bereft. We are the Mark Darcy to their Bridget Jones: We love them just as they are, even if what they are is totally nutrageous. They are delicious, glamorous divas and you best believe they have their eyes on you:

One of them plans to kill you with merely one well-placed acrylic toenail and the other one will just very, very awkwardly seduce you. Guess who is who?!

Now, you've surely already perused Sharon's archive, as well as Posh's. Their choices haunt your dreams, their abuses of their stellar genetic material has had you racked with sobs on more than on occasion. You love them, you hate them, you love to hate them, you hate to love them, you love to love them -- who are we to judge you? But you feel about them, and you feel strongly. Let's take a wee peek at some NEVER SEEN BEFORE fugs before we head into the voting booths, shall we?

And then there were four: On Thursday, the champions of the brackets will get together and play a sweaty, violent game of two-on-two basketball for the right to win a lifetime supply of caftans. Press-on nails will be a-flyin'. We're so excited!

Once that's done, then there's the Fug Madness polls, in which the Cher champion will face off against the Madonna winner, with Bjork and Charo's respective victors clashing next. Those victors will duke it out on Monday for the crown. It's going to be so intense that we're using any spare minutes in the day to meditate, stretch, dry out our livers, and check in on how David Silver is coping with his drug addiction over on SoapNet.

By request, here's a filled-out bracket for people who are just returning from vacation and want to download a filled-in, the-story-so-far bracket that shows how we got from 65 to 4 (although clicking on our Fug Madness archive and reading through is probably more fun): Download Fug_Madness_bracket_finalfour.jpg

Now, here are you bracket winners.

WINNER: (2) SHARON STONE

It had gotten to the point where we thought it couldn't be done. Tiny little 5-foot-nothing (or so we assume) Courtney Peldon turned into the giantess of this competition, laying waste to every higher seed that stood in her way. But she was no match for the pure, unbridled, nutty flavor of a hot cup of Sharon Stone. When you wear a rat's paw pinned to your jacket, you trump spangled bra tops -- or at least, that's what we're assuming the lesson is here. We also quite sincerely hope Sharon DOES take Courtney under her wing,  because maybe they could bust this thing wide open in 2009 by competing as a pair. Somebody please get on arranging that.

Sharon will next compete against the winner of the Madonna bracket, who is...

(1) POSH vs. (6) BEYONCE

Beyonce has had it rough here -- it's been an endless string of divas for her, from Kylie Minogue to Helena Bonham Carter (who isn't so much a diva as a Derelicte devotee, but whatever -- in terms of TALENT, she has as much right to be a diva as any of these people if not more) to Sienna Miller, who frankly, would probably like you to think she's a diva but who is more accurately a sheep in Kate Moss's clothing. And now she gets Victoria Beckham. It's got everyone buzzing. Unless that's just a side effect of having had water trapped in my ear for two days.

These two women really aren't so different. Beyonce, for example, isn't averse to wearing dresses that barely rein in her assets -- or, what we lovingly refer to as "Pulling a Posh" -- and Victoria is wildly unafraid of hot pants.

Beyonce's grocery shelf may not be as squished and crammed, but the effect is the same: One false move and the melons will go flying. As for Posh, well, she could well be the daughter Tina Knowles never had, if you don't count the two she does.

And at times -- inexplicable, ill-advised, presumably hung-over times -- these women both prairie it up in garish style...

(1) CHLOE SEVIGNY vs. (2) BAI LING

Holy cannoli. How can one choose between these two? Between them, they've handily destroyed the likes of Tara Reid AND Mary-Kate Olsen, but as much as we'd like them to both somehow emerge from this match winners, there can be BUT ONE.

But which one?

Princess Catsuit McCigarette?:

Lady Underpants?:

Or these two?

(1) MISCHA BARTON vs. (3) PARIS HILTON

Oh, these two. These two wacky kids. They've shared so much: boys, booths at Hyde, a dramatic ping-ponging back and forth from looking like Crazy on a Hanger and Hey! Kind of Pretty. Like so:

Bored. But cute! (I like polka dots.)

But then...