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The BBC has done what Daleks and the Master couldn't - they have shelved the Doctor, at least for a year. Following speculation tied to David Tennant's theater schedule for 2008 (see below) the BBC laid bare its plans for Doctor Who, including a hiatus until 2010. Following the upcoming fourth series, the BBC has confirmed Doctor Who will star in three specials similar to the Christmas episodes in 2009, and will return in 2010 with Daid Tennant. Russell T. Davies involvement has not been confirmed. <> Noel Clarke, who played Mickey Smith, has hinted he may return to Doctor Who even though his character is trapped in an alternate dimension. Clarke also wrote an episode of Torchwood, but was coy when asked about future scripting work. <> Has Billie Piper left Doctor Who to become a call girl? The answer is yes, as she will star in The Secret Diary of a Call Girl, a new drama for ITV2. To prepare for the story, planned as a glimpse behind the scenes of the high-class sex trade, Piper has been socializing with real prostitutes about her character. <> Doctor Who, specifically Steven Moffat's The Girl in the Fireplace, won the best dramatic presentation Hugo award for 2007. Moffat won the previous year for The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances. Other Who nominations included School Reunion and Army of Ghosts/Doomsday. <> Bernard Cribbins, a companion to Peter Cushing in the film Daleks: Invasion Earth 2150 AD will appear in the 2007 Doctor Who Christmas special, Voyage of the Damned. Cribbins had also previously appeared in the Big Finish eighth Doctor story Horror of Glam Rock. <> David Bowie, on his web site, debunked a Sun rumor that Bowie would appear in the Doctor Who Agatha Christie story in the upcoming season. The BBC News later released a story also debunking the Sun's claim. The British show The Friday Night Project, on the other hand, reported that Bowie will star in series four. <> The BBC has issued a statement warning fans about online David Tennant impersonators, who inhabit chat rooms and other forums, providing misleading rumors as truth. <> Freema Agyeman has become involved in a bizarre counter-propoganda campaign by the BBC following TV writer Jimmy McGovern's accusation of institutional racism. McGovern claimed "you see lots of black faces in the BBC. But you see them in the canteen. You do not see them in positions of power." A BBC statement pointed out Agyeman as well as Omid Djalili and the Dance X shows to counter this message. Doctor Who has been awarded program of the year at the Edinburgh International Television Festival. The award is chosen by the 200 young up-and-coming television talent chosen to attend. <> TV Guide critic Matt Roush wrote a positive recent review for Torchwood. David Tennant lighted the party for the annual Blackpool Illuminations festival in August. The annual festival known for decorative and creative electric lighting also included a Doctor Who exhibit with several monsters from the current series. <> Doctor Who and David Tennant won public television awards including Best Drama and Best Actor. Torchwood won for Best New Drama. <> Tennant is scheduled prominently in the 2008 Royal Shakespeare Company line-up, as Hamlet starring with Patrick Stewart (Star Trek TNG) and also in Love's Labours Lost, a Shakespeare work featured in Who episode The Shakespeare Code. <> The BBC theater web page Whatsonstage posted an online interview with Peter Davison, who stars in Spamalot. <> Paul McGann shot down rumors that a movie starring his Doctor was in the works He added that he would go back to the show though, but they had not called. <> On Aug. 26 Who fans descended on Manchester to break a world record for the largest number of Daleks in one place. 68 Dalek outfits destroyed the previous record of 50. The Sci Fi channel has announced the features included in the first season of Torchwood, to be released on Jan. 8, 2008. Among the features are Welcome to Torchwood, Torchwood Sex, Violence, Blood and Gore, and The Captain's Log as well as 7 other features in addition to commentaries and outtakes. Torchwood made its US premiere on the cable channel BBC America in September (although I'm sure we'll stop the presses if PBS ever gets it.) <> The British gay blogger group After Elton will run video logs (vlogs) following each airing on Torchwood on BBC America. Michael Hinman, founder of the sci-fi web site SyFyPortal.com and actress Meredith Hogan will host. <> Big Finish has updated info on the first part of their upcoming series Dalek Empire: Fearless. The production stars Noel Clarke who will not be returning as Mickey Smith but will play Kade, a rough soldier, along with Maureen O'Brien who also will be playing a new role, of General Agnes Langden. <> Simon Guerrier has left the Bernice Summerfield series, handing it to Eddie Robson. As a result, the 2008 schedule for the continuing stories of the once Who book companion has been reduced to one new book and four audio dramas. Thomas Grant (Vanity Fair) will join the production at Peter, Bernice's son. <> Big Finish has released details on The Mind's Eye, a November release featuring the fifth Doctor and Peri. In October Absolution, a feature about the eighth Doctor and pseudo-companion C'rizz, who departs in the story. <> Mad Norwegian Press announced About Time 6 in December. They also announced a new update to their Doctor Who guidebook Lance Perkin's AHistory, now including all Who in one timeline through series three, as well as all Big Finish audios and Torchwood and Sarah Jane Adventures episodes, as well as Who magazine comic strips dating back to 1979.
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Heroes marked the first coordinated global Heroes World Tour for the DVD release Aug 28. Three simultaneous tours in Europe, Asia, and North America featured 12 of the major actors. <> Veronica Mars star Kristen Bell has signed on for an arc of Heroes in October. The much sought actress will play Elle, a sexy and mysterious lady with ties to Peter, Claire, and her father. Producer Tim Kring has promised a couple of new even more scary villains in the first 11 episodes. A mock documentary Takezo Kensei: Sword Saint has begun web streaming on the Yamagato Fellowship site, a false site set up to promote the hit show. Narrated by John Rhys-Davies (Lord of the Rings), each 3-4 minute installment tells of the swordsman's Herculean labors to find and slay White Beard, a Genghis Kahn wannabe out to conquer Japan. Kensei will be played in Heroes by David Anders (Alias), whose non-Asian heritage will be a major plot point. <> Heroes returns on Sep. 24 with a new super-menace and a promise that one major character thought dead will return, while one major character will die. Several new heroes include the gestalt-powered Maya and Alejandro, fraternal twins from the Dominican Republic, Monica, an overly emotional survivor of Katrina-ravaged Louisiana, and Ricky Gervais (The Office) who will play an as yet unknown character. Nichelle Nichols will also appear as another New Orleans survivor, who will care for Micah. The season starts 4 months after the climactic seaosn one ender, with the mysteries behind what happened between slowly unraveling throughout the season. <> Lost will return in February 2008 with several new cast members as well. Arthur Stevens (Lance Reddick, The Wire) is an intimidating corporate recruiter. Actor Ken Leung (Saw) will play Russell, a brilliant mathematician who dabbles between science and mysticism. Charlotte is a hot, young twenty-something athletic academic. Jeff Fahey (Grindhouse) will join in an undisclosed role. Also an episode will feature a female 30s translator working at a university translating French to English. Producer Carlton Cuse promises the show will remain much the same, but now will incorporate "flash-forwards" in addition to the flashbacks. <> Paul Reubens, best known as Pee-wee Herman, has signed on to Pushing Daisies. Reubens will play Alfredo Aldarisio, a traveling homeopathic antidepressant salesman in the offbeat program about a man whose touch brings life or death. Oddly, ABC TV president Stephen McPherson told reporters that Pushing Daisies will debut in the Lost timeslot because 'its so quirky there isn't a lead-in show that would work'. One early program deals with the dilemma that Ned saves a woman who dedicated her body to medical science. <> Crystal Lowe (Black Christmas) has joined The Bionic Woman, playing the lead character's best friend. <> The Reaper comes with 13 episodes about Sam, who just turned 21 and learned that his parents sold his soul before he was born. Satan explains that Sam is now his personal bounty hunter, returning the worst evil back to hell. Smallville returns on Sep. 27 with the more heroes and villains and more guest appearances. The conclusion of Bizarro sees Lex Luthor in a strange reformation, due to a young new Kryptonian visitor - Supergirl (Laura Vandervoort). America's Next Top Model's Eva Pigford will appear as a beauty winner with a deadly super-powered secret. The role of Zor-El, Supergirl's father, has been rumored to go to Kevin Sorbo (Andromeda). In addition, former Supergirl Helen Slater will play the aunt of young Kara. Dean Cain has signed on as a possible villain with the talent to "cure" meteor freaks and a connection to Dr. Swan (Christopher Reeves). The Martian Manhunet will return, as will the Justice League with possibly new members. The Manhunter has a mysterious history with Supergirl. <> Supernatural returns on Oct. 4, with Ruby, played by Katie Cassidy (daughter of singer David Cassidy) joining the cast in a new quest to hunt for the horde of demons who escaped from hell in the previous year. Also joining is Bela (Lauren Cohan), another demon hunter. Series creator Eric Kripke added that the girls are recurring characters, and will not appear in every episode. They're not being introduced as love interests; they're being introduced as antagonists. <> Ghost Whisperer comes back Sep. 28 with Melinda seeing more ghosts and saving more lives. <> Fox has delayed its immortal cop series New Amsterdam to midseason, but it will show at the New York film festival on Sep. 6. The series, set and shot in Manhattan, is considered a good fit for the festival. <> The SciFi Channel has announced its fall schedule, with Stargate Atlantis debuting on Sep 28 with Torri Higginson (Elizabeth Weir) returning in December. In October SciFi will air "mini-sodes" of Battlestar Galactica during Flash Gordon. The shorts tell of Lee Adama's mission on the Pegasus and Adm. Cain's story of the Cylon war. Galactica returns in 2008. <> Stargate Atlantis will bring back Dr. Carson Beckett (Paul McGuillion), who was killed in the third season, for a two-parter. Also guest-starring is Torri Higginson (Weir) and Christopher Judge (Teal'c). The BBC has announced the DVD release of Jekyll, the modern adaptation of Jekyll and Hyde written by Steven Moffat (Doctor Who and starring James Nesbitt (Match Point. <> HBO has picked up True Blood, a vampire series from Alan Bell (Six Feet Under). Anna Paquin (X-Men) stars as a waitress who falls for a vampire, in the slightly comedic horror. <> Star Trek alum Colm Meaney is finishing talks to co-star in Life on Mars, an ABC pilot remake of a popular British time-travel series by David Kelley. The show centers on Sam, a detective who is transported to 1972 after his girlfriend is kidnapped. Meaney will play Detective Hunt, a gruff '70's cop who clashes with hero Sam (Jason O'Mara). <> Producer David Eick (Bionic Woman) said he has finished a pilot for Them, and hopes for a midseason pick-up. The show focuses on a sleeper alien cell in Los Angeles - composed of aliens for who human emotions is a deadly virus, but who long to be human.
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Transformers director Michael Bay backtracked from an internet promise to drop his involvement in any sequels due to Paramount exclusively using the HD DVD format. Both Paramount and Dreamworks have signed exclusive deals with the HD DVD format, while Fox has signed with competitor Blu-ray. <> Zach Quinto (Heroes) recently talked about his role as a young Spock in the upcoming Star Trek academy movie. He stated the Spock here will be at a different place the classic version. Leonard Nimoy will appear in a cameo as the older Spock, a point which William Shatner noted since the former Capt. Kirk does not appear. The new movie deals with the first mission of younk Kirk and Spock. According to one rumor Russell Crowe (Gladiator) is in talks to play the villain. A separate internet rumor proposes a cameo by Tom Cruise, who would play Christopher Pike. <> Dan Bradley (Bourne Ultimatum) has signed as the second director of the upcoming untitled James Bond movie. An internet rumor states that the Justice League of America, about the premiere super-hero team of Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman, and others, is complete and will be fast-tracked. Planned for release in 2009, the movie is considered a launching pad for the Superman sequel as well as Aquaman, Flash, Wonder Woman, and Green Lantern movies. A separate rumor has that the movie will be rendered in motion-capture animation, similar to the soon released Beowulf. <> Iron Man director Jon Favreau promised fans that the film teaser, shown at the San Diego Comic Con, will "soon" be on the web. Favreau said both Marvel and Paramount have agreed to web posting of the footage, but thanked fans for their patience. <> Kevin McKidd (Journeyman, Rome) is rumored to be cast as Thor, based on the Marvel comics adaptation of the Norse god. One problem, however, is the schedule which may be rushed in anticipation of a looming writer's strike. <> A magazine rumor stated that Katie Holmes (Batman Begins) made a special trip to LA to sign up as Wonder Woman, based on the DC heroine. The movie has been stalled since Joss Whedon (Buffy) dropped out. <> Brian Taylor (Crank) will write and co-direct Jonah Hex a supernatural western based on a polpular comic character. The movie will be dark and dirty, straddling a fine line of supernatural stuff, Taylor stated, "lots of amputees". <> Carla Gugino (Threshold) will play Sally Jupiter, aka the Silk Spectre in the comic classic Watchmen. The movie is set in an alternate America where super-heroes are banned in a thinly veiled allegory to cold war arms proliferation. Gugino's Jupiter is a burlesque dancer turned heroine sex symbol. <> David Goyer announced preproduction on Magneto, a movie about the X-Men villain. The movie tells of his and Charles Xavier's origins in creating the X-Men. Goyer also talked about Super Max, a movie about DC hero the Green Arrow, who is wrongly sent to a supervillain prison and forced to fight his way out amidst third-rate supervillains out for payback. <> Scarlett Johansson (Match Point) will star in The Spirit, joining Eva Mendes (Ghost Rider), Samuel L. Jackson, and Gabriel Macht (The Good Shepherd). The movie is based on the comic book tale of a rookie cop who fakes his death to fight crime from the shadows. Frank Miller (300) wrote the script and will direct. Johansson will play a sultry femme fatale named Silk N. Floss Morgan Freeman reaffirmed his intention to adapt Arthur C. Clarke's Rendezvous With Rama to the big screen. The book deals with the mystery arrival of a 30-mile-long spaceship. Freeman, who is working with director David Fincher (Alien 3) said, "It's a very intellectual science fiction film, a very difficult book to translate cinematically." <> Logan's Run will be updated with a new SF script by Tim Sexton (Children of Men). The movie's premise will still deal with the premise that anyone beyond a certain age is sentenced to death, but the update is planned as a low-tech SF futuristic story closer to the original book premise rather than the 1976 movie. <> Roland Emmerich (The Day After Tomorrow) will remake The Fantastic Voyage for 20th Century Fox. The film is about 5 scientists who are miniaturized and injected into a fellow scientist who is dying from a clot. <> Len Wiseman (Underworld) will remake Escape From New York, starring Gerard Bulter (300). Butler will play Snake Plissken, the convict and war hero sent into futuristic Manhattan, turned into a giant max-security prison. <> Jason Statham and Joan Allen will star in Death Race, a remake of cult classic Death Race 2000. Allen will play the warden of a prison where prisoner Statham is forced to brutally drive for his life. <> David Duchovny recently told Access Hollywood that he has read a script for X-Files 2, which would star him and Gillian Anderson. <> Keanu Reeves has agreed to star in The Day the Earth Stood Still, the remake of the 1951 classic. Reeves would play Klaatu, the humanoid alien accompanied by a large robot. The original film's premise, an allegory to the cold war, is being updated with current visual effects. <> Ron Livingstone (Standoff) has joined Eric Bana (Hulk) and Rachel McAdams (Wedding Crashers) in The Time Traveler's Wife a New Line adaptation of the Audrey Niffenegger novel. The SF book tells of a dashing librarian (see, SF) who is born with a gene causing him to involuntarily time travel. <> Zac Efron (High School Musical will star in New Line's Seventeen, a fantasy about a 36-year-old man who wakes up as a studly high school senior. <> Rosario Dawson (Sin City) will produce and star in The Gemini Division, a live-action motion-capture animated SF web series. Dawson, who hopes to parlay the project into a TV series, film, and video game, plays a New York cop whose husband is murdered and discovers a conspiracy of alternate life forms assimilated into the public. <> Regency has acquired The Darkest Hour, a SF action thriller with a promised secret twist. <> Fox has picked up Drop Dead Diva, a supernatural script about a would-be model who dies and finds her soul transported into an unattractive, overweight female attorney.
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A fan-produced "lost" Star Trek episode titled New Voyages: World Enough and Time is available for download at the Magic Time web site. The episode stars George Takei and is co-written by Marc Scott Zicree, a writer for TNG and Deep Space 9. <> LA's Universal theme park's Back to the Future ride has closed forever. The ride, a staple since 1993, will be redesigned and reopened as a Simpsons oriented coaster ride. <> The original lightsaber from Star Wars will be sent into space on shuttle Discovery this October, to commemorate the film's 30th anniversary.
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Would you like to engage in the exciting world of news-casting? You too can be a trove of science fiction knowledge and amaze your friends with irrelevant or irreverant trivia designed to mock and amuse. If interested in being a part of the tradition that is this column, contact Barbara Brown or Mark Hansen. Sources: Outpost Gallifrey, BBC.com, Sci Fi Weekly, Kryptonsite, Spoilerfix, Variety, Zap2It.com, SuperHype, Gateworld, and Aint It Cool News |