Report 40A. 29 May 2001
This is a digest of recent Sci-Fi- and genre-related news as of 29th May 2001.
News & Notes
Group News:
Enterprise Press Book Page
I have a scan of the “Enterprise” page from the Paramount New Season Press Book if anyone would like a copy. It’s a fairly large file, so not for the faint hearted.
I also have a scan of the poster from Godzilla GMZ. Same applies.
Xena 6.5a
For anyone who took Xena 6.4a and wants to go straight on with the episodes in order, I now have up to episodes 19, so I can offer Xena 6.5a, with episodes 16 – 19. Please let me know if this is how you want to proceed.
Obviously, for anyone who waited for Xena 6.4 to be complete, I will do Xena 6.5 when I have episode 20 next week.
TV News:
Whedon: 'Buffy' Musical
Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator/producer Joss Whedon is talking, again, about his upcoming musical episode of the series.
While talking to TV Guide, Whedon sounded a little nervous himself of the November sweeps episode, saying, "I actually think it's going to be good... But it is something I've never done before, so it's a little nerve-racking."
Whedon also explains the episode's story's emphasis on singing, saying, "It's about what it's like to live in a musical world, because all our guys are gonna start singing and dancing, and they're gonna be like, 'Did anybody notice that we were just singing and dancing? What's that all about?' It's basically the repercussions of living in that kind of world.
"I think of it as kind of a sequel to [last season's Emmy-nominated episode] 'Hush,' in the sense that 'Hush' was about when you stop talking, you start communicating, and the musical is about when you sing, you express yourself, things you wouldn't otherwise express — which can be great or very destructive."
Angel Women Face Future
Angel's two blondes--cop Kate (Elizabeth Rohm) and vampire Harmony (Mercedes McNab)--have uncertain futures on The WB series, TV Guide reported. Rohm recently started work as the new assistant district attorney on NBC's Law & Order, which shoots in New York--a continent away from Angel's L.A. set.
"I think [the Angel brass] want me to [return], but it would be so hard just because it's on the opposite side of the country," Rohm told TV Guide. "In all perfect worlds, I think I'd like to continue, because it would be great to do two different parts at the same time. But it is a little hard geographically."
As for Harmony, McNab told the journal that she has hopes of reappearing on the Buffy the Vampire Slayer spin-off series as the ditzy bloodsucker. "[Buffy creator] Joss [Whedon] is just very loyal to the people who work for him," said McNab, who initially auditioned for the role of Buffy Summers. In Harmony's last appearance on Angel, she joined a vampire cult. "They ended up cutting the final scene of [the episode]--I was in Mexico, recruiting people for the cult," she said. "I don't know if that's indicative of what's going to happen, or if that was a tiny thing. ... But they were talking about [bringing back Harmony]. It's just all up in the air right now."
Night Visions Finally Gets to Air
After waiting for over a year, Night Visions finally gets onto the TV screen. There was no sign of it in the Fox Fall Schedule, so I had just about given up hope for the series, but it has now appeared as a new show for the summer – Night Visions Premiers July 12th.
Episodes will be available as and when we have them. Keep an eye on Part B.
TV Is New Battlefield
Undaunted by the box-office failure of Battlefield Earth, producers announced the start of an animated BE television series, featuring the voice of Dan Haggerty (Grizzly Adams) as the villainous alien Terl. Author Services Inc., which represents the L. Ron Hubbard novel on which Earth is based, said that Japan's Pine Com International would produce 13 episodes of an Earth series.
Haggerty will voice the English-language version of the series. Hong-Kong action star Chow Yun Fat is supposedly in talks to voice Terl in a Chinese-language version of the series, according to an earlier report by Variety columnist Army Archerd.
Duchovny Closes X-Files
David Duchovny told Sci-Fi Weekly that he won't return in the ninth season of The X-Files, even in a small way. Speaking to press while promoting his upcoming film, Evolution, Duchovny said he wouldn't do cameos, as he had in the last season.
"I don't think that's fair to me or the fans and I'll tell you why," Duchovny said. "I think that the consciousness of the show is this quest of Mulder's, and the core of the show is Mulder and Scully. When I came back at the end of this year, by necessity and by my choice of not being on the show full-time, other ideas, other stories, had to come center stage. When I came back, I felt somewhat peripheral. Not me, but Mulder's story was somewhat one of three or four stories now that were going on. It didn't feel like the same show to me, and I think to bring back Mulder peripherally is not fair to the character that I feel a lot of affinity for. I feel like the fans respect Mulder as the center consciousness of the show, and to have him come back, like Superman's dad or whatever, just feels cheap to me." Duchovny said he would still be interested in another X-Files feature film.
As for questions left unanswered at the end of the last season, Duchovny said he did not know who fathered Scully's child, nor how the season finale's ending kiss would resolve next season. "I will be interested to see, like anyone who is a fan of the show, how it gets resolved, because they will have to resolve me while I'm not there. I hope they don't say, 'Oh, I'm glad Mulder's gone. What an ass--. He had a baby with me, kissed me and now he left.'"
Woodburn: No Place Like Gnome
Danny Woodburn--who plays the gnome, Carl, in UPN's Special Unit 2--told Sci-Fi Weekly that he didn't know until the very last moment that the genre series would be back in the fall. "I had no idea whether or not we'd get a pick-up," Woodburn said in an interview. "It had been a long time since we'd shot the pilot, then re-shot the pilot, then did our six episodes. I did a movie [Death to Smoochy] in between the time we finished the first six and the day we got word we were picked up, which was the day before UPN announced its fall schedule in May."
Asked what he'd like to see for his character when the show returns to the airwaves, the actor--whose credits includes Conan: The Adventurer and The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas--said that he'd like to see Carl do more. "Carl does a lot, but you see him on the phone a lot or hear about things he's done, but they're actually done out of sight," Woodburn said. "I want to see more of these things on camera, because I think it'll help fill in a lot of the details about the character."
Woodburn added, "I'd like to see him interact more with the other 'links.' It'll be cool to see who Carl's contacts really are. It'll be cool to see him conduct another armed robbery. I've heard that [series creator] Evan Katz wants to have Carl do more Mission: Impossible-type of stuff. He loves those little bits of me coming through air vents and breaking into places. I think fans will dig seeing more of that stuff."
Buffy To Downplay Giles
Anthony Stewart Head--Giles on Buffy the Vampire Slayer--confirmed that his Watcher character will no longer be a regular on the series when it moves to UPN in the fall. Rather, Giles will be more of a recurring character, Head said in an interview.
"There will be a couple of shakeups" in addition to dealing with the shock season-ending, Head said. "I'm going to spend a bit more time in England next year, so Giles will be spending a bit more time in England next year. That will be a change. I'll be more of a recurring character next season. I'm spending more time in England next year, because I want to be ... with my family more, not because I have any problem with the show. You never tire of Buffy. It's just such fun."
It remains to be seen whether the much-talked-about Giles spin-off will come to pass. Set and filmed in England, the proposed series would star Head. But the veteran actor is wasting little time finding new work back home. "I'm doing a BBC series called Manchild. It's about four men in their 40s dealing with life, sex and midlife crises. It's like a male equivalent of Sex and the City. I am one of the four men, and the others are Nigel Havers, Don Warrington [Red Dwarf] and Ray Sturges."
Movie News:
Shrek Sequel Planned
Shrek producer John H. Williams told Variety columnist Army Archerd that a sequel to the hit animated movie is in the works. Shrek came in second in the Memorial Day weekend box-office rankings and has taken in an estimated $99.1 million after just 10 days of release.
Williams produced the DreamWorks film with Aron Warner and Jeffrey Katzenberg and was first exposed to the story when his sons, then 5 and 6 years old, got him hooked on William Steig's 28-page book of the same name seven years ago, Archerd reported. Williams has since screened the movie in a Boston theater to 93-year-old Steig, his children and grandchildren, and the author approved. "You've kept it very faithful to the book," Steig reportedly told Williams.
'Cloak & Dagger' Movie
Dimension Films has signed a deal to create a live-action feature film based on the Marvel comic book characters and series Cloak and Dagger.
According to Variety, scribe David Tischman, who has previously written the Mutant X comic books, will handle the script for the coming film. The eventual film will be produced by Marvel big shot Avi Arad and Rick Alexander, the latter of whom is involved in the new developing Conan movie.
While talking to the trade, Arad was candid about the characters' third tier status among other Marvel Comics properties, saying, "I compare Cloak and Dagger with Blade, in that they aren't the most high-profile Marvel properties, but audiences will identify with them. This will be an action-packed, exciting movie."
The story of Cloak and Dagger is about two runaways, a white girl from an affluent home, and an African-American boy from the streets. The two become the subjects of evil experiments resulting in bringing forth strange powers. The girl becomes Dagger, and she throws blades of shining white light. The boy becomes Cloak, a being wrapped in a huge cloak that feeds off the criminals' life energy they battle. Always precariously on the edge of going truly bad by his almost uncontrollable power, Cloak's evil impulses are held in check by Dagger, whose blades, when tossed into Cloak's dark dimensional void, also serve to keep him on the good side.
New Stargate Movie Planned?
Peter DeLuise--a writer and director of Showtime's Stargate SG-1 series--told TV Highlights magazine that producers are coming up with suggestions for a possible feature film. There's no script yet, but DeLuise said the movie suggestions are "like the show, only much bigger, more elaborate and faster."
Will SG-1 return for a sixth season? "Most of the actors have contracts for only five years," DeLuise told the magazine. "After that time, some of them will certainly want to continue with the show, while others may not. The most important factor will be Richard Dean Anderson [Jack O'Neill], because if he doesn't want to go on with a sixth season, there won't be a sixth season. He is the main character."
“Faith” As Wonder Woman?
A rumor is going around that Buffy the Vampire Slayer co-star Eliza Dushku (Faith) is the latest actress in the running to play Wonder Woman in Joel Silver's upcoming film. Dushku, 21, joins Sandra Bullock, Xena star Lucy Lawless and pro wrestler Chyna as possible contenders to take up Diana Prince's golden lasso.
A spokesperson for producer Silver (The Matrix) told reporters, "The story is still in development and there's no production office set up for the film yet."
Sandra Bullock has said on several occasions that she's interested in the role, but not the "watered-down" version Lynda Carter played in the 1970s TV show of the same name. She also suggested that she's not eager to don Carter's trademark skimpy red-blue-and-gold outfit.
Odds and Ends: Short items not worthy of an article in their own right.
Burger King will tie in with New Line Cinema's Dec. 19 release of the first Lord of the Rings movie, The Fellowship of the Ring, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The tie-in will include in-store and online promotions. The burger chain has the option to partner on the film's two sequels, planned for next year and 2003, the trade paper reported.
Canadian actor Tom McManus will play the villainous Marcus Eckhardt in the upcoming syndicated SF television series Mutant X, the Toronto Sun reported. John Shea will play the leader of a group of genetically enhanced mutants who are running from McManus' character, the head of the Genetic Security Agency. The show begins production in Toronto this week.
With Charmed having just been renewed for its fourth, fifth, and sixth seasons, it's currently unknown who will step in to replace Shannon Doherty to complete the witch's circle but rumor has it that Tiffani Thiessen and Jennifer Love Hewitt are in the final running.
This is a digest of recent Sci-Fi- and genre-related news as of 29th May 2001.
News & Notes
Group News:
Enterprise Press Book Page
I have a scan of the “Enterprise” page from the Paramount New Season Press Book if anyone would like a copy. It’s a fairly large file, so not for the faint hearted.
I also have a scan of the poster from Godzilla GMZ. Same applies.
Xena 6.5a
For anyone who took Xena 6.4a and wants to go straight on with the episodes in order, I now have up to episodes 19, so I can offer Xena 6.5a, with episodes 16 – 19. Please let me know if this is how you want to proceed.
Obviously, for anyone who waited for Xena 6.4 to be complete, I will do Xena 6.5 when I have episode 20 next week.
TV News:
Whedon: 'Buffy' Musical
Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator/producer Joss Whedon is talking, again, about his upcoming musical episode of the series.
While talking to TV Guide, Whedon sounded a little nervous himself of the November sweeps episode, saying, "I actually think it's going to be good... But it is something I've never done before, so it's a little nerve-racking."
Whedon also explains the episode's story's emphasis on singing, saying, "It's about what it's like to live in a musical world, because all our guys are gonna start singing and dancing, and they're gonna be like, 'Did anybody notice that we were just singing and dancing? What's that all about?' It's basically the repercussions of living in that kind of world.
"I think of it as kind of a sequel to [last season's Emmy-nominated episode] 'Hush,' in the sense that 'Hush' was about when you stop talking, you start communicating, and the musical is about when you sing, you express yourself, things you wouldn't otherwise express — which can be great or very destructive."
Angel Women Face Future
Angel's two blondes--cop Kate (Elizabeth Rohm) and vampire Harmony (Mercedes McNab)--have uncertain futures on The WB series, TV Guide reported. Rohm recently started work as the new assistant district attorney on NBC's Law & Order, which shoots in New York--a continent away from Angel's L.A. set.
"I think [the Angel brass] want me to [return], but it would be so hard just because it's on the opposite side of the country," Rohm told TV Guide. "In all perfect worlds, I think I'd like to continue, because it would be great to do two different parts at the same time. But it is a little hard geographically."
As for Harmony, McNab told the journal that she has hopes of reappearing on the Buffy the Vampire Slayer spin-off series as the ditzy bloodsucker. "[Buffy creator] Joss [Whedon] is just very loyal to the people who work for him," said McNab, who initially auditioned for the role of Buffy Summers. In Harmony's last appearance on Angel, she joined a vampire cult. "They ended up cutting the final scene of [the episode]--I was in Mexico, recruiting people for the cult," she said. "I don't know if that's indicative of what's going to happen, or if that was a tiny thing. ... But they were talking about [bringing back Harmony]. It's just all up in the air right now."
Night Visions Finally Gets to Air
After waiting for over a year, Night Visions finally gets onto the TV screen. There was no sign of it in the Fox Fall Schedule, so I had just about given up hope for the series, but it has now appeared as a new show for the summer – Night Visions Premiers July 12th.
Episodes will be available as and when we have them. Keep an eye on Part B.
TV Is New Battlefield
Undaunted by the box-office failure of Battlefield Earth, producers announced the start of an animated BE television series, featuring the voice of Dan Haggerty (Grizzly Adams) as the villainous alien Terl. Author Services Inc., which represents the L. Ron Hubbard novel on which Earth is based, said that Japan's Pine Com International would produce 13 episodes of an Earth series.
Haggerty will voice the English-language version of the series. Hong-Kong action star Chow Yun Fat is supposedly in talks to voice Terl in a Chinese-language version of the series, according to an earlier report by Variety columnist Army Archerd.
Duchovny Closes X-Files
David Duchovny told Sci-Fi Weekly that he won't return in the ninth season of The X-Files, even in a small way. Speaking to press while promoting his upcoming film, Evolution, Duchovny said he wouldn't do cameos, as he had in the last season.
"I don't think that's fair to me or the fans and I'll tell you why," Duchovny said. "I think that the consciousness of the show is this quest of Mulder's, and the core of the show is Mulder and Scully. When I came back at the end of this year, by necessity and by my choice of not being on the show full-time, other ideas, other stories, had to come center stage. When I came back, I felt somewhat peripheral. Not me, but Mulder's story was somewhat one of three or four stories now that were going on. It didn't feel like the same show to me, and I think to bring back Mulder peripherally is not fair to the character that I feel a lot of affinity for. I feel like the fans respect Mulder as the center consciousness of the show, and to have him come back, like Superman's dad or whatever, just feels cheap to me." Duchovny said he would still be interested in another X-Files feature film.
As for questions left unanswered at the end of the last season, Duchovny said he did not know who fathered Scully's child, nor how the season finale's ending kiss would resolve next season. "I will be interested to see, like anyone who is a fan of the show, how it gets resolved, because they will have to resolve me while I'm not there. I hope they don't say, 'Oh, I'm glad Mulder's gone. What an ass--. He had a baby with me, kissed me and now he left.'"
Woodburn: No Place Like Gnome
Danny Woodburn--who plays the gnome, Carl, in UPN's Special Unit 2--told Sci-Fi Weekly that he didn't know until the very last moment that the genre series would be back in the fall. "I had no idea whether or not we'd get a pick-up," Woodburn said in an interview. "It had been a long time since we'd shot the pilot, then re-shot the pilot, then did our six episodes. I did a movie [Death to Smoochy] in between the time we finished the first six and the day we got word we were picked up, which was the day before UPN announced its fall schedule in May."
Asked what he'd like to see for his character when the show returns to the airwaves, the actor--whose credits includes Conan: The Adventurer and The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas--said that he'd like to see Carl do more. "Carl does a lot, but you see him on the phone a lot or hear about things he's done, but they're actually done out of sight," Woodburn said. "I want to see more of these things on camera, because I think it'll help fill in a lot of the details about the character."
Woodburn added, "I'd like to see him interact more with the other 'links.' It'll be cool to see who Carl's contacts really are. It'll be cool to see him conduct another armed robbery. I've heard that [series creator] Evan Katz wants to have Carl do more Mission: Impossible-type of stuff. He loves those little bits of me coming through air vents and breaking into places. I think fans will dig seeing more of that stuff."
Buffy To Downplay Giles
Anthony Stewart Head--Giles on Buffy the Vampire Slayer--confirmed that his Watcher character will no longer be a regular on the series when it moves to UPN in the fall. Rather, Giles will be more of a recurring character, Head said in an interview.
"There will be a couple of shakeups" in addition to dealing with the shock season-ending, Head said. "I'm going to spend a bit more time in England next year, so Giles will be spending a bit more time in England next year. That will be a change. I'll be more of a recurring character next season. I'm spending more time in England next year, because I want to be ... with my family more, not because I have any problem with the show. You never tire of Buffy. It's just such fun."
It remains to be seen whether the much-talked-about Giles spin-off will come to pass. Set and filmed in England, the proposed series would star Head. But the veteran actor is wasting little time finding new work back home. "I'm doing a BBC series called Manchild. It's about four men in their 40s dealing with life, sex and midlife crises. It's like a male equivalent of Sex and the City. I am one of the four men, and the others are Nigel Havers, Don Warrington [Red Dwarf] and Ray Sturges."
Movie News:
Shrek Sequel Planned
Shrek producer John H. Williams told Variety columnist Army Archerd that a sequel to the hit animated movie is in the works. Shrek came in second in the Memorial Day weekend box-office rankings and has taken in an estimated $99.1 million after just 10 days of release.
Williams produced the DreamWorks film with Aron Warner and Jeffrey Katzenberg and was first exposed to the story when his sons, then 5 and 6 years old, got him hooked on William Steig's 28-page book of the same name seven years ago, Archerd reported. Williams has since screened the movie in a Boston theater to 93-year-old Steig, his children and grandchildren, and the author approved. "You've kept it very faithful to the book," Steig reportedly told Williams.
'Cloak & Dagger' Movie
Dimension Films has signed a deal to create a live-action feature film based on the Marvel comic book characters and series Cloak and Dagger.
According to Variety, scribe David Tischman, who has previously written the Mutant X comic books, will handle the script for the coming film. The eventual film will be produced by Marvel big shot Avi Arad and Rick Alexander, the latter of whom is involved in the new developing Conan movie.
While talking to the trade, Arad was candid about the characters' third tier status among other Marvel Comics properties, saying, "I compare Cloak and Dagger with Blade, in that they aren't the most high-profile Marvel properties, but audiences will identify with them. This will be an action-packed, exciting movie."
The story of Cloak and Dagger is about two runaways, a white girl from an affluent home, and an African-American boy from the streets. The two become the subjects of evil experiments resulting in bringing forth strange powers. The girl becomes Dagger, and she throws blades of shining white light. The boy becomes Cloak, a being wrapped in a huge cloak that feeds off the criminals' life energy they battle. Always precariously on the edge of going truly bad by his almost uncontrollable power, Cloak's evil impulses are held in check by Dagger, whose blades, when tossed into Cloak's dark dimensional void, also serve to keep him on the good side.
New Stargate Movie Planned?
Peter DeLuise--a writer and director of Showtime's Stargate SG-1 series--told TV Highlights magazine that producers are coming up with suggestions for a possible feature film. There's no script yet, but DeLuise said the movie suggestions are "like the show, only much bigger, more elaborate and faster."
Will SG-1 return for a sixth season? "Most of the actors have contracts for only five years," DeLuise told the magazine. "After that time, some of them will certainly want to continue with the show, while others may not. The most important factor will be Richard Dean Anderson [Jack O'Neill], because if he doesn't want to go on with a sixth season, there won't be a sixth season. He is the main character."
“Faith” As Wonder Woman?
A rumor is going around that Buffy the Vampire Slayer co-star Eliza Dushku (Faith) is the latest actress in the running to play Wonder Woman in Joel Silver's upcoming film. Dushku, 21, joins Sandra Bullock, Xena star Lucy Lawless and pro wrestler Chyna as possible contenders to take up Diana Prince's golden lasso.
A spokesperson for producer Silver (The Matrix) told reporters, "The story is still in development and there's no production office set up for the film yet."
Sandra Bullock has said on several occasions that she's interested in the role, but not the "watered-down" version Lynda Carter played in the 1970s TV show of the same name. She also suggested that she's not eager to don Carter's trademark skimpy red-blue-and-gold outfit.
Odds and Ends: Short items not worthy of an article in their own right.
Burger King will tie in with New Line Cinema's Dec. 19 release of the first Lord of the Rings movie, The Fellowship of the Ring, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The tie-in will include in-store and online promotions. The burger chain has the option to partner on the film's two sequels, planned for next year and 2003, the trade paper reported.
Canadian actor Tom McManus will play the villainous Marcus Eckhardt in the upcoming syndicated SF television series Mutant X, the Toronto Sun reported. John Shea will play the leader of a group of genetically enhanced mutants who are running from McManus' character, the head of the Genetic Security Agency. The show begins production in Toronto this week.
With Charmed having just been renewed for its fourth, fifth, and sixth seasons, it's currently unknown who will step in to replace Shannon Doherty to complete the witch's circle but rumor has it that Tiffani Thiessen and Jennifer Love Hewitt are in the final running.
posted by Catherine Jemma at 8:26 PM
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