ABOVE: C. Thomas Howell's butt was unsurpassed. Follow me here!

Bonus hot guy of the day is DEWEY MARTIN. (Image via movie still)

BELOW: Keep reading for Syria, Judy Garland, naked guys and more...

Starting, and putting out, fires (Image via video still)

SOCIALITE LIFE: Hottest guys of the week.

NEWSWEEK: On a personal note, my dad's cousin, accomplished MLB player and coach Merv Rettenmund, died yesterday at 81. A longtime chewer of tobacco, he died of cancer of the throat and stomach. It's a sad time, as he and my dad were very close as young men and were known as Ma (my dad is Marv) & Me around Flint, Michigan. For as long as I can remember, many times when I would be speaking to an older man on the phone — a clerk, a salesman, someone in health care, the USPS — he would ask me, sheepishly, if I were related to Merv, and usually would express shock and delight that I was. This happened within the past two months. He was a very good player, and I've seen many kind words about his death. RIP.

HUFF POST: In a crushing defeat for both Russia and Tulsi Gabbard, Assad's regime has fallen in Syria, with the brutal dictator fleeing.

TWITTER: Trump admits he can't guarantee American consumers won't pay more due to his fucked-up tariffs.

Find someone who looks at you like Brian Thompson's assassin looks at a taxi's surveillance camera. (Image via CrimeStoppers)

NYT: Brian Thompson's hot assassin is seen — clearly! — in the back of a cab in new footage. Believe me, people know who this dude is by now.

JOE.MY.GOD.: Trump thinks the January 6 Committee belongs in prison, but will pardon all the rioters, including the ones who fought cops. Insanity.

RAW STORY: McConnell is sniping at Trump, ineffectually.

When he did play gay again, in Queer, he didn't hold back. (Image by Matthew Rettenmund)

DEADLINE: Daniel Craig avoided playing gay during his James Bond run because he felt it would appear “reactionary.”

PENN LIVE: Lance Bass says that when he came out as gay, he lost “everything” — including a pilot for The CW.

VARIETY: Eugenio Derbez felt the need to savagely critique Selena Gomez in Emilia Pérez, both for her acting and her accent. Did we see the same performance? I found her to be extraordinary, and her character isn't supposed to speak flawless Spanish.

SNL: Paul Mescal's Gladiator II — The Musical.

EXTRATV: One of only four known pairs of Judy Garland's Wizard of Oz ruby slippers has sold for a whopping $32.5M (all fees included) at Heritage Auctions. The previous high price for a pair was $2M spent by Steven Spielberg and Leonardo DiCaprio, who headed a group of donors in order to present that pair to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences. A pair that was a different-looking rehearsal pair was sold by Debbie Reynolds for over $600,000. These slippers sold for six times the amount achieved by Marilyn Monroe's white dress from The Seven Year Itch in 2011.

Fan & collector Philip Bambarger holds the $32.5M shoes! (Image via Instagram)