SciFi Weekend: CW Superhero Crossovers; Celebrities on The Election; Luke Cage; American Gods; Doctor Who; Class

Digital Spy reports on the threat which brings together the heroes of the four Berlantiverse DC shows on CW. Trailer above.

There’s only one army in the DC Comics universe terrifying enough to unite Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl and DC’s Legends of Tomorrow.

Turns out that the threat of meta-humans running wild has raised the ire of planets across the galaxy, causing an alien race to form its own coalition in order to conquer and subjugate earth’s superheroes.

“This year, for our mega Arrowverse crossover, we’re taking inspiration from a DC crossover from the late 1980s known as Invasion!, which featured an alien race called the Dominators, who’d previously vexed the Legion of Superheroes,” Arrow and Legends of Tomorrow producer Marc Guggenheim revealed in a statement.

“We’re using cutting edge prosthetics and computer effects to achieve a feature film-quality look which is faithful to Invasion! artist Todd McFarlane’s interpretation of the characters.”

The Dominators made their first appearance in the pages of DC Comics all the way back in 1967, and have continued to cause trouble for the Legion of Super-Heroes and others within the DC Universe ever since.

This autumn’s four-night event will be the first of two major DC crossovers. Supergirl and The Flash will also be meeting up for a musical episode that’s sure to be interesting.

Supergirl also teams up with her cousin in the above trailer.

The Mary Sue reports that Lynda Carter Used Hillary Clinton As Inspiration For Her Upcoming Role on Supergirl. Hopefully this doesn’t mean that the president on Supergirl will engage in regime change in other countries based upon dubious arguments and sell influence from the White House.

Related story at Paste: Whitewashing Hillary: When Lena Dunham and Her Celebrity Ilk Become Dangerous. Obviously celebrities are hardly the people who we should trust with political analysis, but of course they are going to give their opinion. J.J. Abrams and many a long list of people involved in Star Trek have taken a stand against Donald Trump in a long open letter on Facebook. Unfortunately they also have fallen for the whitewashing of Hillary, and fail to recognize the importance of third party options. Trump is a celebrity in his own right, including The Apprentice and the recent revelation of his appearance in a softcore porn Playboy video.

Netflix has released Luke Cage. There is some background information in the Marvel 101 video above. I haven’t had time to watch it yet and hope to start next weekend. Speakeasy has some information on the series:

Showrunner and writer Cheo Hodari Coker (“Ray Donovan,” “Southland”) talked to Speakeasy about the show and shared some key details that will make “Luke Cage” different than “Daredevil” and “Jessica Jones,” its Marvel predecessors on Netflix.

It takes place after “Jessica Jones,” but it’s all about Luke’s perspective.

The super-strong, nearly indestructible Luke Cage showed up as a butt-kicker and love interest during the first season of “Jessica Jones,” alongside series star Krysten Ritter. Yet, while “Luke Cage” will build on that foundation, it will be told through his perspective. “It doesn’t take away from the Luke you meet in Jessica Jones, but we’re telling a different story,” Coker says. “At the same time, I’m hoping people who see the show that like Luke from ‘Jessica Jones’ like what we’ve done in expanding the character.”

It aims to be the Tribe Called Quest of superhero shows.

The show’s cast is mostly made up of black actors, but Coker, who is also black, wanted to make sure it’s also representative of black culture, while keeping it relatable to all audiences. “I wanted to show it was possible that it had a deeply African-American context but do it in such a way that people who weren’t necessarily from hip-hop culture, or from black culture, and watch the show feel as though they’re part of the conversation,” he says. Coker points to A Tribe Called Quest’s albums as examples of art that both maintained its integrity within the context of black culture and still registered crossover success.

It draws on all sorts of Marvel Comics traditions.

Coker says Brian Michael Bendis‘s “Alias” comics have inspired the look of this Luke Cage, while much of the character’s origin story on the show comes directly from the 1972 comic “Luke Cage, Hero for Hire” No. 1. The showrunner, though, says a variety of Marvel Comics — from Chris Claremont and Frank Miller‘s Wolverine to X-Men comics in general — helped him develop his skills as a writer and dramatist in the televsion world. He says the issue-by-issue run in a comic book story line works well for TV. “That’s kind of the way you structure the season,” Coker says.

More information at TV Guide for before viewing. This article at TV Guide looks like it will be of interest after viewing.

the-tick

Amazon recently began showing a pilot for The Tick, which started as a comic and was also briefly on television in the past. It has been picked up for to start as a series in 2017.  CBR,com interviewed creator Ben Edlund:

CBR News: Ben, the new “Tick” pilot is something of an outlier as it’s rare for creator-owned comics to get a second big media adaptation let alone a third one. And I know this particular project took a long time to come together and had many twists and turns along the way. What was it like for you to go through that process of bringing the character to TV over a decade since the last go round?

Ben Edlund: It was, I would say, some of the scarier work I’ve done recently. [Laughs] This is a very specific character for me. I have a lifelong relationship with this creature, and so to engage with another expression of it and take the chances of messing it up or what have you, it makes you feel like it’d be pretty nice to just let it sit there. This is something I take very seriously, and I didn’t want to do this if it didn’t have a new reason for being and if it wasn’t something that wasn’t its own new thing on top of being another respectful chapter in the existence of this blue creature.

So that put the stakes up pretty high for me. And working with Amazon, we kind of started in a place that was quite distant from where we ended up. There was a lot of growth over the drafts we did, and I had to take time to figure out how to engineer a superhero live-action comedy in a way that would not be immediately ephemeral. It had to be something you could care about. So it was a very daunting bit of work for me.

I was very much the beneficiary of the 13 years I’ve spent working in live-action television. When I first did this, I had no experience other than some film school experience and cartoon experience. Now I’ve been doing this for a long time and working almost exclusively in this hybrid between drama and comedy. That started with “Firefly” and “Angel,” but with “Supernatural” and even “Gotham” and “Powers” – all of them incorporate elements of other things. That’s been a craft I’ve been drawing from and trying to learn about because I did actually feel like eventually it would be appropriate to look at Tick again and try to do something new with it.

And I didn’t know where that would be or when it would take shape. I didn’t even initiate the first ripple that led to this series. That was actually Patrick Warburton and Barry Josephson and others. It just kind of encompassed me, and it was time. It was ready to happen again. So when they came to me and asked if how I could conceive of it being doable in live-action, it took a long time to get my head around it.

Aside from your place as the creator coming back to his creation, the really interesting thing about the new Tick is that the superhero media landscape is vastly different than it was 15 years ago. For a long time, comics was the landscape where you could do anything and get deeper and weirder, while TV was much more restrictive. Now mass superhero media is bigger and weirder than it’s ever been. How has that changed your approach?

I think #1 right now is we’re at a point of superhero saturation. No one could have predicted how comprehensive it would be and how pervasive it would be. And so the level of education per capita [that the audience has] on the minutia of a superhero universe offers a lot more latitude in terms of joke material – because there’s just more to reference. That’s one part of it. The other part is that we’re the beneficiaries of technology. Big effects are a lot more achievable now, and so our vision is wider. That’s a great tool to have.

But I think the thing that’s most intriguing and interesting is that the whole complexion of television has changed. It’s gone from where we sort of anti-serialized stories and promoted the stand-alone ones to where things are completely engaged with the experience of serialization. People want that from these “binge vehicles.” What they want is a novel in televised form which is shaped and conceived as novels are. Those are not things that are free jazz improvisations as a general rule. They’re stories. It’s a demand that’s increasing with our appetite, and I’m happy about that because that’s the thing I want to do. I don’t want it to just be jokes. And nobody else wants that either, which is weird. The conventional wisdom of almost any other era of television was that we’d reduce things to just jokes. But this is a very different organism, and I’m intrigued by the experiment.

american-gods

Nerdist has a video report providing information on the television adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s novel American Gods. Screenrant summarized some of the key points,  including:

Nerdist News went deep with the cast and crew of American Gods and discovered that the series will follow a path somewhat different from the novel that inspired it. Far from being a true diverging, however, Nerdist reports that the series will not only cull from the near 600-page edition of Gaiman’s text, but also from the author’s character and plot notes, many of which either didn’t make it in, or were merely alluded, to in the novel.

According to Nerdist, much of the expanded story will follow the tales of how the Old Gods came to dwell on American soil. While the novel does tell the stories of how gods like Kristin Chenowith’s Easter and Orlando Jones’ Mr. Nancy left their original homes for our shores, the series is expected to dive even deeper into these character backstories to create a richer, more full universe.

Considering how well Bryan Fuller re-imagined the Hannibal books and movies, I am optimistic he will do a good job with American Gods, especially he will be working with ideas also created by Neil Gaiman.

NBC has picked up This is US for a full eighteen-episode season.

FX reports that The Strain will conclude with season four. FXX has renewed You’re The Worst for a fourth season.

There reportedly will be a  a superhero character appearing in this year’s Doctor Who Christmas Special.

DigitalSpy held a contest in which David Tennant’s 10th Doctor was voted the best TV character of the 21st century

ScreenRant has some videos to introduce the Doctor Who spinoff Class.

 

Save

Save

Save

SciFi Weekend: Orphan Black; Game of Thrones; The Blacklist; 12 Monkeys; Star Wars The Force Awakens; Doctor Who Spinoff Class; Suicide Squad

Beth (TATIANA MASLANY)

We knew from the preview I posted last week that Orphan Black would begin with a flash back, but it was a surprise that almost the entire episode dealt with Beth Childers and other clones prior to when the series began. Seeing Beth gave a better feel for why she jumped in front of a train in the first episode. Beside seeing her drug problem, we saw far more than we previously knew about her troubles with Mark and how close she was to Art. It was also interesting to see some of the other clones in their younger, more innocent days. Beth, whose primary role appears to be to handle the money for the clones and supply Beth with pills, has not yet shot a gun, and Cosima’s biggest concern is finding a place to live while going to school.

The most important aspect of the episode was probably the introduction of another clone, M.K., who was both more knowledgeable than the other clones about the situation, and (probably justifiably) more paranoid. She says she is only alive because they think she is dead. We don’t get until the present until the end of the episode when M.K calls Sarah, now hiding in Iceland, with the warning: “Neolution knows where you are. They’re coming for Kendall Malone….You need to run. Right now.”

Felix even had a cameo, presumably never looking up to see a clone of Sarah in the police station. Buddy TV has an interview with Jordan Gavaris which reveals that Felix’s relationship with Sarah is strained, and he has more time with the other clones.

Game of Thrones enters new territory this season, going beyond the books, and might be wrapping up sooner than many have predicted. Variety reports:

In an exclusive interview with Variety, showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss said they are weighing wrapping up the Emmy-winning saga of Westeros and the battle for the Iron Throne with just 13 more episodes once this sixth season is over: seven episodes for season 7; six for the eighth and potential final season.

“I think we’re down to our final 13 episodes after this season. We’re heading into the final lap,” said Benioff. “That’s the guess, though nothing is yet set in stone, but that’s what we’re looking at.”

Sources later clarified those exact numbers were premature, given that the showrunners are now just beginning to outline their plans, but said that any upcoming seasons may be shorter than the full 10 episodes of seasons past.

Trailer for the upcoming season is also above.

Blacklist wedding day

I’ve looked at a lot of deaths on genre shows the last few weeks, but the most unbelievable was on The Blacklist. (Major spoiler ahead). Even more so than on Sleepy Hollow, the female lead is too important a character to have die without a major change in the series. Possibly they do plan on a major reboot of the series, which is always possible as long as they have James Spader, but I am quite suspicious that in this case they are faking Lizzy’s death as part of a plan to keep her safe. Perhaps they will use a need for Lizzy to appear dead as a means to prevent her from being with Tom and her baby, which might have limited her actions.

12 Monkeys

Blastr has an interview with the cast and crew of 12 Monkeys and their planned 17-season arc. Here is the start of the interview:

You managed to build a layered, compelling story in the first season, which also featured quite a lot of world-building. Now that you’ve laid that creative groundwork, can you talk about what’s it like to really get to play in this sandbox you’ve built for Season 2?

Terry Matalas: It’s a lot more fun. In a lot of ways, it’s almost like Season 1 is the prequel to Season 2. Things really starts to get going, and we’re moving through time in ways we weren’t able to in Season 1. We’re able to mix and match characters and really try new things. The stakes are higher, and it’s a lot more fun. The show really finds itself in Season 2.

In the early parts of Season 2, Cassie really seems to start taking point in regards to the mission that drives the narrative of the show. In a way, she feels more like the Season 1-era Cole than the character of Cole does now. Can you talk about that change in Cassie, and how her time stranded in the future has affected her?

Amanda Schull: I think it was a slow burn to build this person, but you’re right. Her time in 2044 is what solidifies that very dramatic shift. She had only ever heard of this life that Cole was grappling with, then when she’s forced to live in it, herself, she realizes that intelligence doesn’t necessarily accomplish goals in every scenario, and it won’t help you survive every scenario. She really becomes a product of that world.

Star Wars Rey

There has been a lot of speculation that Luke or possibly Leia and Han are Rey’s parents in Star Wars The Force Awakens. I would not entirely trust anything J.J. Abrams says about character identities after he denied that Benedict Cumberbatch would be playing Kahn in Star Trek Into Darkness, but he gave the impression that these theories about Rey might not be true when he said this about Rey: “Rey’s parents are not in Episode VII. So I can’t possibly in this moment tell you who they are. This is all I will say: It’s something that Rey thinks about too.”

Abrams has since clarified the issue saying: “What I meant was that she doesn’t discover them in Episode VII. Not that they may not already be in her world.” In other words, Luke could still be her father, but she doesn’t learn that in the next movie. Or perhaps she does, and he doesn’t want to give it away.

Abrams has also discussed, once again, the similarities between The Force Awakens and A New Hope:

“[‘The Force Awakens’] was a bridge and a kind of reminder; the audience needed to be reminded what ‘Star Wars’ is, but it needed to be established with something familiar, with a sense of where we are going to new lands, which is very much what 8 and 9 do. The weird thing about that movie is that it had been so long since the last one. Obviously the prequels had existed in between and we wanted to, sort of, reclaim the story. So we very consciously — and I know it is derided for this — we very consciously tried to borrow familiar beats so the rest of the movie could hang on something that we knew was ‘Star Wars.’”

Class cast

The BBC has announced the cast of the Doctor Who spinoff, Class, which takes place at Coal Hill School. Stephen Moffat had this to say about the series:

There’s nothing more exciting than meeting stars that nobody’s heard of yet. We had the read through of the first few episodes last week, and there was a whole row of them. Coal Hill School has been part of Doctor Who since the very first shoot in 1963, but this new show is anything but history. Class is dark and sexy and right now. I’ve always wondered if there could be a British Buffy – it’s taken the brilliant Patrick Ness to figure out how to make it happen.

I wonder what he means by a British Buffy. Is it just a matter of having a cast in this age range, or will there be other similarities?

Suicide Squad

The upcoming Suicide Squad movie will apparently have a lot of Batman, which should increase interest in the movie. There are also reports that the sequel might be R-rated. Deadpool has already done well with an R-rating, and the same is planned with Wolverine 3.

SciFi Weekend: Hannibal; Mr Robot; Jessica Jones; Patrick Stewart; DC Television Universe; Star Wars Expansion at Disney; The Last Ship; Person of Interest; Homeland

>Hannibal mask

…And The Beast From The Sea continued the portrayal of Red Dragon on Hannibal, and provided the first glimpse of Hannibal Lecter wearing the mask he is famous for in the movies. Hannibal remained in contact with the Tooth Fairy, and even joked about using personal ads or notes on toilet paper to facilitate this in a reference to the novel where this was a more substantial plot point. Hannibal suggested that Dolarhyde  kill Will’s family, leaving viewers uncertain if he would succeed in killing Molly or Walter. Instead a guy just happening to drive by became the victim. Dolarhyde presumably also poisoned the dogs, but fortunately they also survived.
In some ways Hannibal seemed even more evil in this episode, placing Will’s family in risk in this manner. (“They’re not my family, Will”). To Hannibal, perhaps Will is his family, but Molly and Walter are just in the way. Elsewhere in the episode,it was not surprising to see Dolarhyde’s relationship with Reba fall apart, despite how Hannibal characterized the relationship.

Jack and Alana showed again that they do not really understand Hannibal, thinking he would assist them in tracking a call to Dolarhyde. Hannibal played with them, and then tipped off Dolarhyde  with the warning that they were listening. Hannibal had previously given Alana the ominous warning, “I always keep my promises.” Now it was Alana’s turn: “You’re not the only one who keeps their promises, Hannibal.” In response to this latest betrayal. She had all the amenities removed which kept Hannibal so comfortable, “The toilet, too.” As these were removed from the cell, the mask was placed on Hannibal for the safety of those in there.

Mr Robot Darlene

On Mr. Robot, Elliot had a brief meeting with the time-obsessed White Rose, but it was the meetings and surprise interactions between older characters on the show which were of greater interest. There is a major spoiler ahead for those who have not seen this episode yet.

The first big surprise was that Angela and Darlene not only knew each other, but at yoga class both talked about Elliot, showing concern for him. Later there was the meeting between Tyrell Wellick and Mr. Robot, with the two apparently working together, even if not entirely comfortably. This seems to confirm that Mr. Robot is real, but raises major questions, especially for those who think that Mr. Robot and Elliot are the same person.

The biggest scene was when Darlene told Elliot that she loves him, Elliot kissed her, and Darlene recoiled in horror asking, “Did you forget who I am?” Soon it was revealed that Darlene is Elliot’s sister. It was as if Luke had kissed Lea, but is Mr. Robot now Darth Vader?

This led to memories flooding into Elliot’s head. Going meta, Elliot looked at the camera and asked us viewers, “Were you in on this the whole time?” and then“Were you?” Maybe to some degree we are in on it, but we are also quite confused at the moment, also looking for answers.

There was the suggestion that Mr. Robot is Elliot’s father, previously said to be dead. This has been interpreted differently by fans who think that Mr. Robot and Elliot are different manifestations of the same person, and those who think he is a separate and real individual. Mr. Robot showed up at Elliot’s apartment to supposedly explain, so maybe we will learn the answer next week. I wonder if the show will move onto a quite different path as it heads toward its second season.

jessicajones-netflix-509x480

Indiewire reports that Jessica Jones will be a psychological thriller, reporting statements from executive producer Jeph Loeb and showrunner Melissa Rosenberg at the TCA Press Tour. They also discussed a major role for David Tennant:

“When we first sat down and started talking about ‘Daredevil,’ what we said was, for all intents and purposes, it was a crime drama first and a superhero show second,” Loeb told the room. “One of the things we’ve talked a lot about is that ‘Jessica’ is in many ways a psychological thriller first and then a superhero show second.”

…Loeb then went on to say that Tennant’s role in the show would be a key part of what differentiates “Jessica Jones” from other superhero series: “What you get out of ‘Jessica’ is a sort of hold-your-breath tension as to what’s going to happen. When you see the dynamic between Krysten Ritter and David Tennant… that question of ‘What’s going to happen next?’ and ‘What could happen next?’ and how that’s driven by character is something that is so important to not just the scripts but also the way the show is shot, and the way that everyone reacts, and the way those two react with each other.”

Elsewhere in the Marvel universe, Professor X (Patrick Stuart) will have a substantial role in the third Wolverine movie.

white-canary-lazarus-pit

Moving on to DC, next season we will see the return of Sarah Lance on ArrowAusiello discussed how Lance responds to the return of Sarah:

Frankly, it could be the last thing Sara’s family needs! “Thanks to Laurel helping him see the light at the end of last season, Lance is back on the wagon for now, trying to keep on the straight and narrow,” Paul Blackthorne previews. “But that will of course be tested when Sara comes back from the dead. Because I think when your daughter’s coming back from the dead, she may not necessarily come back as quite the same person. Yeah, that’s going to be an issue for the family to deal with!’

Her return will also be in an episode with a cross over from Constantine, who assists with her return to life, which in turn leads into the origins of Legends of Tomorrow.

Despite previous reports to the contrary, CBS is now saying there will not be crossovers between Supergirl and Arrow or The Flash. Reportedly they are in the same universe, so this might be open to reconsideration if the right story is presented.

Disney has always provided synergy between their films, theme parks, and merchandise. Therefore it was no surprise to find that, with Star Wars expected to be a huge blockbuster film this December, there will be a fourteen acre expansion based upon Star Wars at Walt Disney World and Disneyland.

TNT has renewed The Last ship for a third season.

Sarah Shahi is returning to Person of Interest following her maternity leave. She will return early in the season and be present for eight or nine episodes of the upcoming thirteen episode season.

The firth season of Homeland sounds like it might be expanding its story lines, dealing with Edward Snowden, Putin, and ISIS.

Donald Trump told a boy on a helicopter ride in Iowa that he is Batman. That is about as ridiculous as Hillary Clinton claiming to be a liberal.

SciFi Weekend: 12 Monkeys; Arrow; The Atom; Spider-Man Joins MCU; X-Men; The Black Widow Project; A Female Thor; Orphan Black; Constantine; How Not To Get Away With Murder; The Americans; The Casual Vacancy; The IT Crowd In Space

12 Monkeys Decaying Body

I had fears that 12 Monkeys could settle on a simple formula of searching for the Night Room and the Army of the 12 Monkeys in our present, and a battle for the facility in the future. I no longer have such concerns about the direction of the show after this week’s episode, The Night Room. Major spoilers ahead for those who might be a week behind. The location of the Night Room was found (mostly off screen last week) and this week’s episode primarily took place there. The relationships between the main characters will not be exactly the same, especially after The Pallid Man told Cassandra that Cole killed Dr. Henri Toussaint in Haiti. There are also questions raised about Jones.

The episode was really interesting when the time travel implications of the virus are considered. Is the skeleton with the virus really Cole’s? Does he eventually develop the plague, despite his current immunity, or is he just a carrier? Does the repeated time travel play a part? Did Jones send his rotting body back in time, and for what reason? Did Jones (inadvertently?) cause the plague? If the answers are in the future which Cole came from, he won’t find them immediately. Although he failed in preventing the plague, he did enough to change the future. With West 7 and not Jones now in control of the time travel facility in the altered future, and with Cassie kidnapped in the past, Cole starts out next week with no allies in either time period beyond an insane girl.

12-monkeys Cassie Night Room

The shows’s executive producers Terry Matalas and Travis Fickett discussed the impact on the mythology with The Hollywood Reporter:

The Night Room is a big return to our mythology and the next big step in learning more not only about the virus, but the origin of this conspiracy,” Matalas says. “We learn quite a bit about the future, too. There is a very big storyline regarding Jones (Barbara Sukowa) in the Night Room. We get to learn what it took to get this time travel project up and running and the sacrifices she made. This episode is the one where we inhibit our skin a little bit more. The show gets a little bit more unique and a little more off-beat from what you may expect. We bring the weird a little bit here in a good way. It’s what makes it 12 Monkeys.

The two creators have a bigger plan in mind for Jones, which began with the early and rare moment of levity from the character at the beginning of “The Night Room.” “It’s definitely building up to something. Jones becomes from here on out a more prominent character with more screen time. That is something we wanted to see, her among the other characters, but also her backstory is really important to the mythology of the show and that is the first hint of it,” Fickett said. “When Ramse (Kirk Acevedo) goes into her room and opens up that chest you see the baby blanket with the name Hannah on it. Suddenly we know there is a whole lot more to this woman and maybe she has deeply personal reasons for changing time as well.”

Matalas, however, notes that messing with time has its consequences both to Cole and time itself. Throughout the Night Room, Cole starts to experience debilitating headaches. “Keep in mind, this is a new process. Cole is the pilot program for this. No one has traveled as much as him. He does have a time clock on himself,” Matalas said.

The changes brought about from the destruction of the Precursor are a major according to Matalas. It’s big enough to break time. “We are not talking about multiple universes. We are talking about one singular timeline. Jones, in [episode] six, explains the difference between loops, or what’s called a jinn, and that’s basically the Sarah Connor. … How Reese had to come back in time to pregnate Sarah Connor so that she can give birth to John Connor who will send his father back in time. It’s one of the infinite loops. That’s called a jinn,” Matalas explains.  “When there are more traumatic changes to the timeline, then you can break the change and that’s what happens in episode six.”

Among the big changes was The Pallid Man’s first mention of hierarchy within the Army of the 12 Monkeys by naming dropping someone called The Witness. When questioned about the character, Matalas and Fickett remained tight-lipped, promising only that the answer will not be what viewers expect.  “It’s not the answer Cole is expecting either,” Matalas said. “Or any of our characters,” Fickett added.

“There is a lot going on with the Army of the 12 Monkeys and by episode eleven you’ll learn a lot more about them. Enough to make your brain explode,” Matalas said. “Releasing the virus could be one of their intended goals, but the end result may not be what you expect it to be. With time travel you’re playing the long game and if you’re dealing with the fate of the entire planet, destruction can be creative in the long run.”

Arrow Ray Palmer Atom Suit

Arrow showrunner Marc Guggenheim is not one of those who subscribe to the theory (mentioned last week) that John Diggle might be John Stewart, who succeeds Hal Jordan as the Green Lantern. I do think that Diggle plays such a key role on Arrow that it makes sense to keep him as he is, although it might be a way to give him a spin-off series in the future after Arrow ends.

We do know that Arrow is on the verge of introducing another superhero. Ray Palmer will put on the Advanced Technology Operating Mechanism (A.T.O.M.) suit, which so far we have only seen as a holograph,  in episode 15, Nanda Parbat. His course as a superhero sounds a lot like Laurel’s. Guggenheim said, “He’s definitely a sloppy superhero in the sense of all of our characters don’t immediately have the easiest time fighting crime. I would say episode 19 really digs underneath what does it mean for Ray to be a hero. Is he a hero because of who he is? Or is he a hero because of the suit that he’s made?” He will not be shrinking initially but will fly:

For me, the most satisfying thing about the costume is, it looks like Brandon walked off of a movie set. I’ve never seen a TV show do a costume of this level of ambition before. He’s got a lot of cool tricks up his sleeve. People who are immediately expecting him to shrink are going to be disappointed. I will say that upfront.

We always say, we’re doing the “Arrow” version of The Atom. That said, there will be some flying involved, which looks remarkably amazing. He has a lot of little gadgets and tricks and abilities built into that suit. I don’t want to spoil exactly what they are, because I think part of the fun of watching is seeing what that suit’s going to do next.

A Felicity Smoak action figure is being released. I won’t discuss this further to avoid getting into Lars And The Real Girl territory.

Spider-Man and Avengers

After several weeks of rumors, it has now been announced that   Spider-Man will become part of the Marvel cinematic universe. It is believed that this means that The Amazing Spider-Man trilogy will not be completed and Andrew Garfield is out as Spider-Man. The deal will allow Spider-Man to appear in an upcoming Marvel Studios movie, assumed to be the upcoming Captain America movie considering that in the comics Spider-Man played a role in the civil war storyline. Afterwards, while Sony will retain ownership and handle distribution, Marvel Studies will collaborate with Sony on the creative end. Considering that Sony has failed in two different attempts at a Spider-Man trilogy, this deal should help both Sony and Marvel. There is also talk of future Marvel cross overs in future Spider-Man movies.

While most fans seem to have been rooting for Marvel Studies to get creative control of Spider-Man, I recently discussed a contrary opinion that this would reduce exposure for some of the lesser comics characters which Marvel Studies has done an excellent job with. I think that, if necessary, it would be worth reducing the number of other Marvel movies in order to have a quality Spider-Man movie series. So far it appears that the only consequence will be to move back the releases dates of four of the planned phase 3 movies. The updated release schedule can be found here.

Wolverine-3-Hugh-Jackman-and-Patrick-Stewart

Hugh Jackman discussed future Wolverine and X-Men movies and the possibility of an X-Men cross-over with the Marvel cinematic universe.

“I like to think there’s that possibility for all of it, and I would even like to think more that it doesn’t happen out of necessity, y’know, when someone’s run it into the ground or something. I optimistically love the idea of “What the hell, Batman versus Iron Man versus Wolverine!” Let’s just chuck ‘em in.

We’ll see what happens, but maybe as these things go on more and more they’ll want to and need to do all that stuff. I’m optimistic, I’d think it’d be great, but hey, it’s not my billions of dollars behind this promise. [laughs] It’s easy for us to speculate, “Why did they do that?!”

Agent Carter has primarily tied into the Marvel cinematic universe with connections to Captain America and SHIELD. Another connection has been the revelation that Carter’s former neighbor Dottie was trained in the Black Widow program. Bridget Regan discussed her role with Comic Book Resources.

Thor Female
I was a bit skeptical when I first heard that the Thor comic was to change to feature a female version of the character, but I saw it more as an attempt to bring in female readers as opposed to anything political. As I do not read it I cannot judge it myself but it does seem from the blogs that comic fans are receiving this favorably. Some conservative see it differently, both disliking the comic and turning it into a political argument. An article on the comic at Breitbart has the title, Female Thor Is What Happens When Progressive Hand-Wringing And Misandry Ruin A Cherished Art-Form. Vox Populi says it is  “exactly the same thing as a communist government taking over a capitalist society.”

BBC America has released a set of teasers for the upcoming season of Orphan Black, which returns on April 18.

Many people were predicting that Constantine would never make it to a second season after the decision to limit it to the first thirteen episodes this season. Now there are rumors that NBC might keep it alive, except move it to the Syfy network and renaming it Hellblazer. This would help with the goal of increasing the number of origianl shows on Syfy, and ratings expectations would be far lower. It is expected that if it does move to Syfy, it would also be able to concentrate more on the horror elements as opposed to trying to be a network procedural.

How To Get Away With Murder is really getting wild as it approaches its season finale. Despite all the flash backs earlier in the season regarding the attempts to burn Sam’s body, they now appear to be in serious danger of getting caught due to portions of his body being found. Didn’t any of them watch the first season of Breaking Bad? Knowing that the show will be coming back for a second season has major implications for any speculation as to how the season will end. Any of the students could conceivably get arrested but Annalise will have to continue with the show. Either she gets off, the mystery is dragged into next season, or perhaps they do a variation on the second season of Broadchurch in which she is arrested and next season deals with her trial. That would also spare them from having to either come up with a new season-long mystery or settle for case of the week episodes.

The Blacklist shows how great acting can save what otherwise would probably be a weak show. Repeatedly we get hope of really learning something and it turns out to be very little. We saw Elizabeth’s memories from the night of the fire, and then were told her memories might have been tampered with and are not accurate. There was more talk about the Fulcrum and it was ultimately found in Elizabeth’s bunny, but it is really just a McGuffin. I just could not imagine watching this show without James Spader.

The Americans remains the best drama which continues a story from season to season on television. (I used this awkward description to exclude Fargo and True Detective, two shows which some critics ranked above The Americans last season.) Personally I didn’t find packing Annelise into the suitcase all that cringe-worthy, but Elizabeth’s tooth-extractions were a different matter. Executive producers Joel Fields and Joe Weisberg discussed the creation of the scene in the video above, from Slate.

Frank Langella is also an excellent addition to the cast as their former and current handler Gabriel. Among the many history lessons from the series, the episode also showed today’s kids how television stations did not stay on around the clock, signing off for the night by playing The National Anthem and then running a test signal.  I haven’t bothered to watch, but I hear that the NBC rip-off, Allegiance, is doing terribly in both reviews and ratings and is not expected to last very long.

A television version of The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling airs tonight on BBC One. The Guardian has a review.

The Guardian reports that the creators of The IT Crowd are working on a sitcom set in space for Channel 4. Shows from Channel 4 have sometimes been made available in the United States over Hulu.