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Is Variety secretly trying to destroy Cate Blanchett's Oscar chances? In an illustration for a strange satirical piece that connects films from 2007 with tenuously related tabloid stories, they've disturbingly grafted Blanchett's Elizabeth: The Golden Age head onto Britney Spears' spangled-underthings-clad, MTV VMAs-era form, creating a pop-star/monarch abomination that will surely haunt the dreams of any Academy voter unlucky enough to flip to page B3.

Surely, any distant chances the actress had of drawing a nomination for Elizabeth have been ruined; if the actress has any hope of saving her universally acclaimed performance in I'm Not There from the taint of the poorly timed unveiling of Frankencate, she'd better beg the Weinstein Company's PR team to immediately cover the trades in For Your Consideration ads showing how completely she transformed into a young Bob Dylan in a desperate attempt to push that terrifying monster from the industry's memory.