The Rooney Mara Bandwagon: Destination Hollywood!!!

The Rooney Mara Bandwagon rolls on.

The Rooney Mara Bandwagon is set to arrive at the Red Carpet 'round about 2 PM PST this afternoon. Well, not at the Red Carpet. We haven't received clearance to be at the Red Carpet. In fact, we've been ordered to stay away from the Red Carpet. Apparently they were frightened some members of The Rooney Mara Bandwagon might try to paint the Red Carpet black, decorate the giant Oscar statues with nose rings and parade to and fro with picket signs reading: They Say We're Insane. Don't Worry. You Can Nod. We Are Insane. (Only two of those were true!) So be it. We don't want to be near your exclusive, puffed-up, wrong-headed gala anyhow! We plan on staking out an empty parking lot, drinking black-dyed beer and repeatedly hacking Tom Sherak's email.

This is an image of an Academy Member who wrote to tell us he would not be voting for Rooney Mara.

It should also be mentioned I recently received a letter from an Academy voter explaining he refused to cast his Best Actress vote for Ms. Mara because - and I quote - "She is a fanboy's fantasy. A computer hacking Coca-Cola addict who can also kick ass real good and ride a motorcyle. I'm voting for Meryl Streep. Even though I didn't actually see 'The Iron Lady.' But don't tell anyone that."

Is she a fanboy's fantasy? Probably. Maybe even positively. But hey, Lisbeth Salander is not my fantasy (my fantasy is Malin Akerman in fashionable boots dancing badly to Yelle at Coachella - I'm just a hipster doofus, not a hipster fanboy) and I didn't form The Rooney Mara Bandwagon because she's like a ninja that attended the Ramona Flowers School. I formed The Bandwagon because of the way Rooney Mara...

1. Graphically wipes her nose on her sleeve on the elevator as she disembarks to go spew gathered information to her employers. This half-second sets the table for her character better than any 2,200 sentences Stieg Larsson could have written. It was the single finest bit of actorly characterization in a movie in 2011.

2. Displays hilariously utter confusion (and minor anger) at the extroverted audacity of Mikael to barge into her apartment and try to - gasp! - decently offer her coffee and a muffin.

3. Releases that shriek in the subway after she's beaten up the moron who has thieved her laptop. Yes, she overtly declares herself as "insane" because the scripted dialogue tells her to but the terrifying release contained in this shriek tells us the same thing.

4. Reacts when the sadistic lawyer of her estate gets up from his chair and comes around to the front of his desk. What follows is, as we know, several shades of pale beyond graphic and yet this reaction, this little recoil that says "Please be wary of my personal space" is more graphic than any of that souped-up awfulness to follow.

5. The detached way she tosses the gift-wrapped jacket for her new "friend" in the trash can when she sees her new "friend" with his lady friend. As if she was expecting this to happen all along.

And thinking about that last one makes me realize Lisbeth Salander wouldn't want that piddly dink Academy Award anyway. If she won, she'd probably just toss it in the trash and ride off into the dark of the moon, The Pride Of The Introverts. And that's how The Rooney Mara Bandwagon would want it. We're the rare fanbase that knows it would be more in character for her not to win and for her not to give a big speech. All we really want is during Billy Crystal's flop sweat drenched opening monologue for her to stand up, declare "You really need to learn to stop talking" and then walk out.

That's our gal.