In a rare public appearance, Michael Jackson held a press conference Thursday at London's O2 Arena to announce "This Is It," aka his "final U.K. performances" (10 of them) at the arena this summer. Sitting in front of a royal red backdrop and sporting a Jackie Onassis hairdo, Jackson looked more like King Cobra than the King of Pop.

(The above video comes from a Michael Jackson fansite, Maximum-Jackson, which faithfully did its best to drum up anticipation for the announcement by assembling a collection of concert footage from throughout the Gloved One's career, with a generous emphasis on those periods when his face did not appear to have been planed.)
 
"I'm going to play the hits, whatever the fans want to hear," Jackson said. Or, to put it another way: Whatever pays off his massive debts. Toward that end, Jackson's Neverland Ranch belongings will be auctioned off April 22 in Beverly Hills.

"Everything must go," according to Julien's Auctions, which is selling personal items such as the pop star's white glove, the Neverland gates and lifesize marble and bronze sculptures of the King of Pop. The auction is preceded with a week-long exhibition that begins April 14. 

While admission for that preview is $20 a head, it promises a spread of worldly goods to rival those of King Tut. The collection is large enough to be divided into eight "sessions:" Garden Statuary and Outdoor Furniture; Antiques, Paintings and Fine Decorative Art; and two sessions each dedicated to Furniture and Decorative Arts; Amusements, Arcade Games and Disneyana; and Memorabilia From the Life and Career of Michael Jackson. Each is represented by its own thick catalog; see below for screen grabs, but it's really worth at least a virtual visit.

RELATED: Not so fast! Michael Jackson sues auction house

More photos, after the jump.

"CBS Consumer Products has just released images of the eagerly anticipated Star Trek Barbie Dolls from Mattel. The dolls have been created mainly for collectors and are for ages 6+. The three dolls - Kirk, Spock, and Lieutenant Uhura - are modeled after the three actors playing the same roles in this summer's blockbuster film STAR TREK hitting theatres on May 8th!

"The price point for the three dolls is $43.19. They will be on shelves April 20th. Mattel is distributing to Walmart and walmart.com, Barbiecollector.com and Barbie collector dealers. They are selling them as an assortment (but the dolls come individually wrapped, no two or three-packs). Select international markets will have the dolls as well (but no specific dates or info. on that yet)." [press release]

All right, I'm impressed. Nerdoh is an online T-shirt company in the UK that appears to have a warehouse in the alternate universe that contains Jack Horner Movie Productions ("Boogie Nights"), the Titty Twister ("From Dusk Till Dawn"), Camp Crystal Lake ("Friday the 13th," of course -- does that one really need the little blood spatter?) and Umbrella Corp. ("Resident Evil"). They're good-looking logos and some are unnecessary (the motel from "The Devil's Rejects"? Really?), but what really gets me is the curators' (for that's what the owners are) obsessive nature. I didn't even remember that Eric Draven had a band in "The Crow," much less that it was called "Hangmans Joke" or that they produced an album, "Last Laugh." (I missed the foreshadowing -- dammit!) Do you know where Indiana Jones taught archeology? (Barnett College, of course.) And if the one for Cross Roads Mall doesn't get you, the one for Andy's Gun Shop will -- it's the place across from the mall that proved so very valuable in "Dawn of the Dead."