And the camera noses in to the tears on their faces: Stories focusing on Charlie Sheen's twin toddlers

Publications: People, Weekly Life & Style
Date: 21 March 2011

Fresh trash on Thursdays! It's easy to think of Charlie Sheen as a human train wreck who deserves all the trouble now coming his way, but two different supermarket rags finally bring up a salient fact that turns makes this comedy feel more like a tragedy.

Charlie Sheen and Brooke Mueller are the proud parents of twin boys who are now two years old. One or both of them will get custody. Right now, Mueller has sole custody, but that only happened recently.

Here's People's take on the story this week.

• Kids caught in chaos
• Sippy cups, porn stars and threats
  
• The upside-down world of the toddlers trapped in Charlie Sheen and Brooke Mueller's ugly custody war

Weekly Life & Style also uses most of the cover with a reminder that there are tiny tots involved in this horrible nonsense.

• Exclusive Interview: Charlie Sheen admits "I'm losing my mind".
• After Charlie loses his job and his kids, friends fear he's suicidal.
• He tells WL&S "My lawyer wants to take the bullets out of my gun."

Here's a sentence I don't type that often.

Whatever Sheen is paying that lawyer, it's not enough.

Demon Drugs Alert™: Brooke Mueller addicted to crack, back in rehab

Publication: Radar (online)
Date: 16 Feb. 2010

It's Ash Wednesday, and as it so happens, all the stories I've avoided telling in earlier updates are at the very least unpleasant and in many cases downright tragic. I didn't start the week planning on this day being such a downer, but it certainly turned out that way.

According to Radar, an online gossip rag, Charlie Sheen's estranged wife Brooke Mueller has checked into rehab (again), this time trying to break an addiction to crack.

If you want to try to put a positive spin on this, at least she is trying to get her life back together. Many other stories today have no pleasant angle.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

On The Rocks Update: Inside Charlie And Brooke's Twisted Marriage

Publication: Star magazine
Date: 18 Jan. 2010

The allegedly legitimate press may be in love with the Tiger Woods story, but the tabloids prefer Charlie Sheen's troubles with his wife. The tabs probably have more informants in place with Charlie and Brooke, and when they beat the crap out of one another, there are actual mug shots and arrests.

Much more fun! It's a scientific fact!

On The Rocks update: Charlie Sheen and Brooke Mueller staying together

Publication: Us Weekly
Date: 18 Jan. 2010

It took only two weeks, but now all bases are covered. We can be certain there was an incident involving domestic violence, what with the arrest and all, but now we have Us Weekly telling us these wacky lovebirds are going to stay together and try to work things out, which contradicts the earlier report in Star Magazine that they are going to divorce.

This gives us a clue as to how uncannily correct the tabloids are. Predict every possibility and somebody has to get it right.

On the Rocks update: Charlie Sheen and Brooke Mueller divorcing

Publication: Star Magazine
Date: 11 Jan. 2010

I'm going to make a special category of On The Rocks update, since the tabloids did not break the story that the Sheen-Mueller union was in trouble until the legitimate press got the story from the police blotter. Since they have not divorced yet, it's still a prediction, and we will see how it plays out, but they only get partial credit for a correct answer on this one. They are supposed to let us know about the possibility of bloodshed and arrests before they happen.

Leaving the Love Boat™: Charlie Sheen and Brooke Mueller

Here's another service we will be providing at It's News 2 Them™: reports on divorces and nasty break-ups that somehow escaped the notice of the tabloids. Since the marital difficulties of Charlie Sheen and his new bride Brooke Mueller include police reports, this is exactly the kind of story the tabloids should have alerted us to in advance, but the jackals of the press missed this one. It goes into the new category Leaving the Love Boat™. Each entry in this category counts as a black mark against the tabloids. Today there will be three such marks.