Did Rupert Murdoch Leak Wolverine? Or Was It The Scientologists?

This story is too great not to post. According to an 'unlawful termination' suit that the lawyer for fired Fox columnist Roger Friedman will file in New York this week, the Wolverine leak can actually be traced back to News Corp. head Rupert Murdoch. Martin Garbus, Friedman's lawyer, claims that Murdoch requested a DVD copy of the film, and "apparently, someone made another copy for themselves." No shit? I'm still siding with Devin at CHUD, who explained how a post-production leak was probably the hole from which Wolverine wriggled onto the internet. But everyone hates Murdoch, so why not pin this on him, too. That's not even the whole of the lawsuit, which claims that Friedman's firing was actually the result of...whisper it...Scientologists! I told you this was great. More after the jump.

Friedman's lawsuit charges that it wasn't his ill-considered (or corporately-directed) review of the leaked Wolverine that got him fired. No, that was just a cover. Friedman has a source that says that as a condition of signing on to Fox's Witchita, Tom Cruise demanded that Friedman be sacked. Supposedly, Kelly Preston lambasted Friedman last year at the funeral of Isaac Hayes (seriously, this is like the second sequel to Get Shorty) for comments he'd made about Scientology. Meetings were held between Fox chiefs and Scientologist spokespeople, agreements were made that Friedman would go easy on Scientologist-related product like Valkyrie and, evidently, that wasn't good enough.

Now, like Rupert Murdoch, it's easy to hate the Church of Scientology. More to the point, it's fun to hate it. And when a college friend made a doc about the Church fifteen years ago, I got to see first-hand (albeit on a small scale) how intimidation tactics might be used to attempt to corral those who speak out against it. So this sort of story is the type of kooky thing that seems so plausible, if all the tales of crazy Scientologist behavior are true. But this is just comedy. Even if it is true, how are Friedman and Garbus going to prove it in court? I know I can't wait to see them try.

[via Vulture. Guess I'm not mad at them anymore for their jerkwad spoiling of Antichrist.]