Sports Illustrated – the magazine than nobody actually gives a stuff about except for once a year when it plonks a girl in a bikini on the cover – has just launched its 2007 swimsuit edition, and the lucky cover-girl this year is famed athlete Beyonce.
Beyonce has apparently made history by appearing in this year's Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition because she's the first woman who isn't a model or an athlete to ever grace the SI swimsuit edition cover. And snagging Beyonce is certainly something Sports Illustrated wants to brag about; as Beyonce poses in a yellow and pink bikini the magazine cover screams 'The Dreamgirl As You've Never Seen Her!' which is certainly true – unless you've seen the video to Survivor, the Pepsi adverts she did, any number of paparazzi shots of her in a bikini or haven't spent the last five years locked away in an entirely sensory deprived environment.
The Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition is one of the world's favourite anachronisms – in the past it has featured supermodels like Elle McPherson and the pre-billionth divorce Christie Brinkley who made the swimsuit edition a sensation, as thousands of men who had never seen a nice-looking woman in a bikini before flocked to newsstands to snap one so they could have a furtive wank and pretend they were interested in the articles. The internet has spoilt that – now you can go online and see anything from Britney Spears' vagina to the 2006 Croatian Eurovision entry having sex the sight of a girl on a beach in a dowdy two-piece is about as titillating as an afternoon discussing flannel with Anne Widdecombe – but god bless Sports Illustrated for trying.
This year the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition has chosen notorious syrup eating nutter Beyonce to star as the cover girl. It's a good choice because a) Beyonce is the most desirable woman in the world and b) she'll be able to shoot crazy epileptic rays out of her eyes to convince men to buy the magazine. All that, plus Beyonce's bikini shoot will be seen as the first step in negotiations to reach a compromise with all the angry fans who wanted to see her engage in lots of lesbian sex with Eva Longoria.
But why Beyonce? Isn't the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition supposed to be about sports and stuff? ABC explains the details:
The 25-year-old singer-actress ("Dreamgirls") posed on a Florida beach in the bikini designed by House of Dereon, the fashion label she started with her mother, Tina Knowles. The 2007 swimsuit edition continues with a music theme inside, featuring scantily clad models posing with Kanye West, Aerosmith, Kenny Chesney, Gnarls Barkley and Panic! At the Disco. A five-page spread featuring Russian Anne Vyalitsyna was shot at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland in September.
You see? The Sports Illustrated swimwear edition is catering for a long-neglected market this year – music fans who like girls in bikinis. Why hadn't anyone thought of that first? Alright, so by chasing a blindingly obvious group of fans, this year's Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition seems more like a static version of a Hip-Hop Honeys DVD with country and western stars instead of rappers, but there's one thing we can all be comforted by.
At least it's not Kirstie Alley in a bikini again.
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Padova says
I don’t think that even the most underwear-stealingly pervered removal man will get turned on by that picture of Beyonce. These days to do that she’d need a bucket of goose fat, six large vegetables and a dog collar
Susan says
Question: Was the spot bought and gifted. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.