SciFi Weekend: Doctor Who; S.H.I.E.L.D.; Defiance; Continuum; Community; Dexter; Once Upon A Time; Zooey Deschanel, Terrorist; And A Warning From The Future

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Hide looked like a ghost story, but this week’s episode of Doctor Who was actually a love story involving two couples (or maybe a third). The young assistant Emma was the real reason for Doctor showing up where he did, to see if the clairvoyant Emma could detect anything unusual about Clara, “the only mystery worth solving.” While nothing unusual was revealed about Clara, Emma did warn Clara about the Doctor’s icy heart. I suspect this will play a part in whatever is revealed in the season finale.

The episode picked up on the theme of the TARDIS not yet accepting Clara, but by the end they worked out their differences and went on to save the Doctor. Last week in Cold War it was necessary to contrive a way to get rid of the TARDIS to avoid a simple solution to being trapped in the submarine. This week did something which few too many episodes do–use time travel as part of a story. This did wind up leaving one time traveler just hanging around, possibly a loose end to come up in  a future episode. It also showed Clara the full meaning of time travel and the Doctor:

Clara: “To you I haven’t been born yet, and to you I’ve been dead a hundred billion years. Is my body out there somewhere, in the ground?”

The Doctor: “Yes, I suppose it is.”

Clara: “But here we are, talking, so I am a ghost. To you, I’m a ghost. We’re all ghosts to you. We must be nothing.”

The behind the scenes video is above.

This was actually the first episode filmed with the modern Clara Oswald, written by Neil Cross, who subsequently wrote The Rings of  Akhaten. Cross did better with his first attempt in Hide.  Like previous episodes since Doctor Who returned, there is an homage to a previous Doctor. This time it is John Pertwee’s Doctor, from a scientist with assistant (or is it companion?) using 1970’s oscilloscopes to the need for a blue crystal from Metebelis III. Will next week’s Journey To The Center Of The TARDIS include references to Tom Baker? I suddenly feel like some Jelly Bellies.

DOCTOR WHO SERIES 7B

Hide played with Doctor What while Steven Moffat has made the question Doctor Who? a recurring theme.  The official synopsis for The Name of the Doctor, the final episode of the season is “Someone is kidnapping the Doctor’s friends, leading him towards the one place in all of time and space that he should never go.” Moffat says we really will learn something we haven’t known about the Doctor, telling Radio Times: “There’s going to be a revelation. I’m not teasing. I’m not wrong-footing you – you’re about to learn something about the Doctor that you never knew before. And I think you’re in for a shock.”

River Song, who proved her relationship to the Doctor by being the only person to know his name in Forest of the Dead, will be returning in this episode. The Wedding of River Song included this warning:

“The Fields of Trenzalore, the fall of the eleventh and the question. The first question, the question that must never be answered hidden in plain sight, the question you’ve been running from all your life. Doctor who? Doctor who? DOCTOR WHO?”

The fall of the eleventh has been interpreted as meaning the time of his regeneration, but it might mean something different if the Doctor’s name really s revealed, or this might not be the secret which is revealed. Even if his name is revealed, there would have to be more to the secret for it to be meaningful. Finding that his name is the Gallifreyan equivalent of John Smith would not mean very much. Perhaps the Grammar Daleks have been correct and  his real name is Doctor Whom.

There is yet another possible clue to a secret in this rumor about the 50th Anniversary episode:

…there are several sites claiming that two very reliable sources have independently revealed that John Hurt will be playing the real 9th Doctor :O Basically Eccleston, Tennant and Smith’s Doctor have either forgotten or have repressed Hurt’s incarnation for some unknown reason, and it is very possible that the secret due to be revealed in the season finale next month is that Smith is the 12th Doctor rather than what his real name is.

I suspect that if this is the case John Hurt’s character might not really be the Doctor, similar to the misdirection in The Next Doctor. The order of the Doctors has become ingrained too much to disturb this chronology. If Matt Smith’s Doctor really is the twelfth, it might give Moffat an opportunity to answer the question of the number of regenerations. Originally Time Lords had thirteen but obviously they will not end the show when this limit comes. There was a throw away line when David Tennant was in an episode of Sarah Jane Adventures claiming 507 but the line wasn’t meant to be taken seriously. They already have had two events in the new episodes which could alter the original limit. As the Time Lords have been overthrown, nobody knows if the old rules apply. There is also the possibility that the Doctor obtained additional regenerations when River Song gave up her future regenerations to save the Doctor’s life in Let’s Kill Hitler There is plenty of precedent for transfer of regenerative powers in Doctor Who, giving Moffat a number of possible routes. Plus, unless the number is extended, where will the Valeyard fit into this–or has the Doctor managed to avoid that fate?

Clark Gregg has a lot of information on S.H.I.E.L.D in the video above. Transcript below via Bleeding Cool:

If you watched The Avengers it was hard to miss the moment where that Asgardian bastard stabbed me quite thoroughly. And I died in The Avengers and it was a sad day because I loved Agent Coulson, and I loved going to the cons and hanging out with the Coulson fans. I was a little heartbroken. The Marvel guys said “You’re dead. You’re dead. But it’s the comics so it’s a different form of dead. Who knows, maybe we’ll see you again some day.”

I thought “You know what, I had a hell of a time playing this guy, I loved the death scene, I loved what Joss did so much,” to want any more of it felt greedy. So when I got a call a couple of months ago to say ‘We want you to come to New York Comic-Con. We’re going to announce that perhaps Coulson lives” I was very curious but also wasn’t sure that I was necessarily down with it.

I didn’t want to do anything to undermine the integrity of The Avengers and Joss didn’t either. So I had a conversation with joss and he explained to me that this [show] takes place after The Avengers, after ‘The Battle of New York’. I’m from New York, I’ve lived in a world after somebody has attacked New York, I know that there’s fall out.

The Avengers version of that world is a world that has superheroes and doorways to other dimensions and chaos. And the way Joss described to me the mystery that takes place in Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD, and the complexity and the unanswered questions about Phil Coulson standing there trying to deal with this, I found it so fascinating and so true to the world of the comics and mythology in general as I understand them that I was immediately in.

I don’t know you could not change going through what he went through in The Avengers. If he hadn’t gone through some kind of change it wouldn’t be any good. That said, I don’t know if he understands how much he’s changed.

It would be surprising to me if this was a world where there wasn’t some reckoning…the fact that there was some level of deception must have been perpetrated on The Avengers. It must have been.

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Defiance has been billed as the next big thing from Syfy but I was not very impressed. The computer-generated special effects looked fake and I just don’t see the point in computer generated graphics which fail to give a sense of reality to scenes which could not otherwise be filmed. The town of Defiance, which is St. Louis around thirty years after a war which has altered earth, provides a scene which could just as easily be an alien planet or a spaceship which contains civilians. Julie Benz is the mayor (or if this was a spaceship, she fulfills the traditional science fiction role of the Captain). In this case, the future looks like the old west, but is far less fun than Firefly. The backdrop will allow for a wide variety of stories, with stories which felt very familiar filling the two-hour premier. Now that we have the setting down, perhaps the series can move onto more original stories.

Continuum is returning to a second season. Star Rachel Nichols was interviewed here. An excerpt:

What can we expect from the new season?
The second season is very interesting. Obviously the first season was very centered on getting home. I wanted to go home. I would be friends with the baddies, I would partner up with Liber8, whatever it took to get home. It’s obviously still important to me in the new season. However, the theme of Season 2 is responsibility. Kagame had a speech at the end of the last season about how, if you drop a pebble on one side of the world, it will become a tsunami on the other. For Keira that’s very, very important, because she wants to get home to her husband and her son. Very early on in season 2, she starts asking questions: what am I going to be returning home to? Am I costing my husband and son their lives? Will they never be born? Will I never be born because of what I’m doing now? It’s a lot to wrap your head around!

This week’s Community brought up the dark timeline. There was also a lot of nonsense such as the group believing they failed, with the grade changing to a C to an F and back again, and a knot which was not a knot. It is clear that new producers David Guarascio and Moses Port do want to keep this show as offbeat and original as it was under Dan Harmon. They just don’t have the ability to pull it off.

Dexter will be returning for its final season. A sneak peak at part of the first episode is above. The final trajectory for the series is in motion, but a spinoff isn’t ruled out.

Emilie de Ravin of Lost teased tonight’s episode of Once Upon A Time by describing her character (after losing her memory) as “young, scantily-clad chick, Lacey.” Okay, she sold me on watching, even if it is on network television.

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Zooey Deschanel was identified on the closed captioning as the suspect being chased in Boston on Friday by one television station. Needless to say, it was a Fox channel. This is no more ridiculous (and false) than most of the type going by while watching Fox, such as identifying Barack Obama as a socialist from Kenya.

From 2068, above is a documentary on The Internet: A Warning from History. The Internet was one of the greatest disasters to befall mankind…

 

SciFi Weekend: The Event; An Ordinary Show; Sheldon as Robot and Annie is a Knock Out; Glenn Beck Tries To Steal Star Wars For The Tea Party

The second episode of The Event gave some answers, but obviously in a show of this nature there is a lot we still do not know. The prisoners are beings which are much like us but age very slowly and differ in their DNA from us by one percent. It is left open as to whether they are aliens or if they have a closer connection to us. The president, after seeing them make the plane flying at him disappear, was far more concerned about the abilities of these beings than he was that someone was trying to kill him, and decided to keep them prisoners.  Sure, having possible aliens in our midst with such powers should concern any president, but he should also be a bit more concerned about a conspiracy which is apparently in his own government to kill him.

Sean Walker remains the show’s key character, leaving me wondering if there is more in his background of importance beyond being engaged to the daughter of man they wanted to pilot the plane. Whoever is behind this sure is determined not to leave any loose ends. When Sean escaped from the ship (which presumably he was supposed to never leave alive) he was framed for murder to make it more difficult for him to talk about what happened.

The second episode continued to jump around in time but not as badly as the first episode. It ended with another cliff hanger, but I think it is a safe prediction that all those people from the plane are not really dead. Reviewers report that the third episode has an even bigger shock.

Another new genre show premiered last week, No Ordinary Family. Unfortunately the episode was far too ordinary to develop a cult following as a genre show. It certainly didn’t have the mystery of Heroes (which unfortunately also lost much of what made it interesting after the first season).

The hardest thing to figure out about this show is how that guy above managed to get a wife who looks like Julie Benz. It is a shame she didn’t have super speed when she was captured by Trinity on Dexter.

The best hour of comedy on network television remain 8:00 to 8:30 with the combined offerings from CBS and NBC. On Big Bang Theory, Sheldon worked on ways to transfer his intelligence to a robot because he calculated that he might not live long enough to make it to the Singularity. Of course Penny suggested Sheldon already had turned himself into a robot. The episode also included a guest appearance by Steve Wozniac.

Big Bang Theory will continue to have major guest appearances, including Eliza Dushku who will play an FBI agent who interviews Wolowitz’s friends so he can get security clearance. According to various tweets from Bill Prady, Will Wheaton will be back before the end of the season. Wolowitz hasn’t seen the last of Bernadette, who also will be returning. Kaley Cuoco will only be missing two episodes following her recent injury while horse back riding. Watch With Kristin reports that Cuoco was actually dating Johnny Galecki for a while in real life as well as on the show.

Meanwhile over on Community, Alison Brie, who is always a knock out, really proved it this week:

I suspected that it would be hard for the competition to stand up against these two shows. My Generation was already canceled by ABC after only two episodes, making it the second casualty of the season. The show was not this year’s Friday Night Lights as a rare favorable reviewer had suggested, but it is also far from deserving such a quick cancellation.

It is bad enough that the Tea Party takes its name from the American Revolution when, in reality, in any analogy to the revolution they would be the Tories who opposed it. Now Glenn Beck is try to steal Star Wars according to this report form Politicususa:

In Glenn Beck’s Tea Party retelling of Star Wars, Barack Obama, the Democratic Party, and progressives are the Empire. He and the Tea Party are the resistance that is fighting to restore the Republic. I guess this makes Beck, Luke Skywalker, and Sarah Palin is Princess Leia. Darth Vader, because he is black would be Barack Obama. The problem with this is that it doesn’t match up with the obvious theme and message of the any of the prequels.

As usual, Beck has taken a quote completely out of context. What Queen Amidala was referring to with the liberty dying quote was the Proclamation of the New Order when Palpatine proclaimed himself Emperor and outlined his vision for transforming the Republic into the Empire. The movie’s proclamation bears a not so coincidental resemblance to the post-9/11 authorization to use force and George W. Bush’s vision of empire through preemptive war. George Lucas may be a lot of things, but he is not subtle.

Star Wars took ideas from many sources, with Lucas being influenced by the power grab by Richard Nixon and the Vietnam war when the original trilogy was written. The prequel movies continued to show that influence, and fit in very well with the corruption of democracy under George Bush and Darth Chaney. Glenn Beck and the Tea Party are those who are trying to destroy our republic and lead us towards the totalitarian empire. They are in no way defenders of liberty.

SciFi Weekend: A Split Season for Doctor Who; Implications of Rita’s Death; Merlin Promo; Jessica Alba in Spy Kids

Doctor Who Christmas Special Matt Smith

In recent  years Doctor Who has concluded with big stories which are wrapped up in two episodes, but they have not concluded with big cliff hangers due to the long wait for the show to return. Steven Moffat had decided to change the schedule to have seven episodes with a big cliff hanger and then return three months later for the second half of the season:

“The split series is hugely exciting because viewers will be treated to two premieres, two finales and more event episodes. For the kids it will never be more than a few months to the next Doctor Who! Easter, Autumn, Christmas!!”

The BBC press office describe the split transmission as the result of a request from Steven Moffat to write a new Doctor Who story arc which involves a big plot twist in the middle of the series. “By splitting the series Moffat plans to give viewers one of the most exciting Doctor Who cliffhangers and plot twists ever, leaving them waiting, on the edge of their seats, until the autumn to find out what happens.”

The Guardian has a video of Moffat discussing this change. In another video Steven Moffat and Karen Gillan responded to accusations that the last season of Doctor Who was too sexy.

In other Doctor Who news, the first official picture from the Christmas special was released, but it doesn’t reveal any information.  Matt Smith was interviewed about an upcoming tour and other topics.  Sylvester McCoy is trying for a role in The Hobbit.

Above is the promo for Season 3 of Merlin.

The cast of Dexter talks about Rita’s death in this post at Buddy TV.  If you want to search for clues as to what happens next, Screen Rant has several pictures from the upcoming season.

Jessica Alba

Jessica Alba has been signed to star in Spy Kids 4.

The new movie centers on Alba as a retired spy who has been reactivated. The actress, mother of a toddler in real life, will be playing the mother of a baby and two preteen stepchildren.

The actors cast in the preteen roles will be the new Spy Kids.

Other roles seeking to be filled include Alba’s husband, a slightly nerdy investigative reporter, and the villain, known as the Time Keeper, whose goal it is to stop time.

I imagine this will be another unrealistic movie. A nerdy investigative reporter married to Jessica Alba? Not likely. I wonder if any of the movie takes place on MILF Island.

More actresses who have appeared in genre shows will appear in Scream 4 including Kristen Bell (Veronica Mars & Heroes), Anna Paquin (True Blood), and Hayden Panettiere (Heroes).

Cristina Hendricks London Fog

Christina Hendricks of Mad Men appears in an ad campaign for London Fog (above). I bet Don Draper would approve. In response to the Japanese businessmen in last week’s episode, I won’t even try to explain what keeps her from falling over.

SciFi Weekend: Torchwood New World Synopsis; True Blood Gets Really Bloody (and Paquin & Moyer Wed); New Season Promos; And Sarah Palin Is No Lisbeth Salander

Jack Gwen Torchwood

Starz has released additional information is out on Torchwood: New World. Here is a synopsis and character descriptions:

Synopsis

When C.I.A. agent Rex Matheson investigates a global conspiracy, he finds himself unearthing a threat which challenges the entire human race.

The answers seem to lie within an old, secret British institute, known only as Torchwood. But Torchwood was destroyed, years ago, and the keys to the institute are held by its only two survivors – former Police Officer Gwen Cooper, who has long since disappeared along with her husband and child, and the mysterious Captain Jack Harkness, a man whose history seems to stretch back centuries.

With Rex under attack from all sides, in both the US and the UK, he soon discovers there are forces at work within every level of society, determined to stop Torchwood’s return. As a chain of events across the world links together the most disparate and unlikely individuals – including a surgeon, a killer, senators and CEOs – a new Torchwood team takes shape. But this time, the threat is much closer to home, as they realize that their greatest enemy is mankind itself…

CHARACTER DESCRIPTIONS

CAPTAIN JACK HARKNESS (John Barrowman)

  • Jack looks like a hero. But he’s so much more than that…
  • He’s American, handsome, with a killer smile and a classic coat. But you don’t expect heroes to be this much fun. He’s witty, fast, subversive and there’s a reason for that glint in his eye – he’ll sleep with women, he’ll sleep with men; if aliens invade, he’ll sleep with them too. Got a problem with that? Tough!
  • His dashing style hides a secret. There are mysteries about Jack – a man going under his name seems to have a history stretching back to World War 2, or even earlier, to the Nineteenth century, the Eighteenth…Truth is, Jack Harkness is immortal. A fixed point in time and space. The only one of his kind. For thousands of years, he has never been able to die. When killed, he comes back to life – seconds later. Though his tragedy is, he feels every death. It hurts – and so does the passage of time. He can never love anyone for too long, because he will always lose them. As a result, he’s lived many lives. He’s been a conman, a thief, an adventurer – though more a rogue than a villain, because his perspective on human life makes him appreciate this world all the more.
  • Jack once ran the Torchwood Institute, a British organization dedicated to fighting the strange and bizarre. He was king of his own little world for a while, the happiest he’d ever been. But Torchwood fell. His friends were killed. The Institute closed down, and Jack disappeared, to start yet another of his many new lives. And yet…
  • The only thing that could call Jack Harkness back is his unstated love for Gwen Cooper. And when a new, epic danger affects the whole planet, Jack finds himself back at the center of events, fighting not just for his own life, but for everyone on Earth. But this time, are the stakes too high?

GWEN COOPER (Eve Myles)

  • All Gwen wants is a quiet life. Honest.
  • She’sWelsh, lives in seclusion, far away from the city, on a cliff top in the wilds of South Wales with her devoted husband, and baby Anwen – it’s a rural idyll.
  • And it’s a lie. Gwen is in hiding, because she once lived the most extraordinary life. She was the heart and soul of an organization called Torchwood, a freelance band of fighters who fought the strange and unexplained. She was a defender of the human race.
  • But no more. Torchwood was destroyed. Her colleagues died, or fled. And Gwen hid herself away, for the rest of her life, to protect her loved ones. But knowing, just knowing, that one day trouble would come calling again.
  • She lives the ultimate double life: the funny, salty, earthy woman who loves home and family, combined with the tough, ruthless warrior, who loves the thrill of the fight. She’s both selfish and selfless. And never doubt it – when Gwen’s in a crisis, she is magnificent. Gun in both hands, baby strapped to her chest, she’ll run and fight and never give up.
  • It’s passion, in the end: Gwen’s all about passion. She loves her man, she loves her child, she loves this mad old world, and maybe she loves Captain Jack Harkness just a little too much. But when the events of this story push Gwen to the limit, she’ll need to call on resources she never knew she had, to take action and make the most terrible decisions, on behalf of all mankind.

REX MATHESON (Actor TBD)

  • He’s 28, the golden boy. Has been, all his life. Harvard education, fast-tracker in the C.I.A., destined for success. Though he’s never taken it easy – Rex hustles, seduces and campaigns to get where he is today. He can talk his way into anything, then charm his way out, fast.
    He’s made a lot of enemies, but his friends and lovers would defend him to death.
  • His choice of career is significant. Someone like Rex could make a fortune in Wall Street, or Hollywood. But choosing the C.I.A. says a lot about him: that for all his swagger, he does believe in justice. And will fight for it.
  • Slowly but surely, we see him make friends. He’s thrown together a bunch of people known as Torchwood, the only people who might have the answer to a global mystery. To Rex, at first, they’re a bunch of freaks. Welsh women and World War 2 Captains, what’s that about?! But as they race from one crisis to another, dodging assassins, blackmail, corruption and conspiracy, from Washington to Wales and the slums of Shanghai, Rex forges friendships in the heat of fire. He learns to trust his new colleagues. And they realize that this dangerous, dazzling, reckless man is the best friend they could ever have, in a world going to hell.
  • They frighten us, men like Rex. We wish we were him; we never will be.

True Blood Anna Paquin Bloody Nude Rolling Stone Cover

True Blood began last week with bloody vampire sex, possibly inspiring the upcoming Rolling Stone cover above,  and had what might be the best ending so far for an individual episode. All that stuff about vampire politics which so far wasn’t very interesting when thrown into previous episodes suddenly has some real meaning. While things got really messed up after Bill’s proposal to Sookie at the end of last season, in real life stars Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer got married Saturday night.

IO9 has a guide to the upcoming television season with several trailers. Above is a trailer for No Ordinary Family with cast including Julie Benz.

Besides the many promos at the above link, there’s also a new trailer available for the upcoming season of Dexter (above).

Sarah Pallin No Lisbeth Salandar

Adam Bessie argues at Truthout that Lisbeth Salander (Girl With The Dragon Tatoo) is the real maverick, and Sarah Palin is no Lisbeth Salander. We might also be seeing far more of the actress who played her on screen. Noomie Rapace who played Lisbeth in the movie version from Denmark, is breaking into Hollywood.

SciFi Weekend: The Hottest Doctor Who Companions; Sherlock; Merlin; Zephram Cochrane and The Budget; Caprica; Dexter; And Amy Pond Goes Over The Rainbow

Topless Robot has chosen The Top Ten Hottest Doctor Who Companions.:

10. Rose Tyler
9. Susan Foreman
8. Leela
7. Peri
6. Martha Jones
5. Zoe Herriot
4. Sarah Jane Smith
3. Romana I
2. Amy Pond
1. Romana II

I can’t agree with the entire list. When I think of hot Doctor Who companions Peri Brown (Nicola Bryant) is the first I’d think of.  She was definitely the most scantily clad companion in most episodes. The above video is from the first episode featuring Peri’s breasts, Planet of Fire. They should be ranked higher, even if not first.

Romana Doctor Who

I can accept Lala Ward’s Romana leading with Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) second but I might have led with the younger Romana (age 139) played by Amy Tamm.  The above picture manages to include both actresses who played Romana. (It’s complicated.)  I would also rank Rose Tyler (Bilie Piper) higher. Amy Pond might be a kiss-o-gram girl, but Billie Piper has even played an actual hooker. Everyone likes Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen), but I never really thought of her as hot. The same goes for some of the others on the list. At least they didn’t rank Tegan.

Sherlock, a modern day reimagination by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, is receiving excellent reviews, such as here. It looks like another BBC show which I’ll have to check out. There have been three 90 minute episodes of the show and more have been ordered.

SyFy has announced they will be broadcasting season three of Merlin in early 2011, shortly after the episodes air on the BBC.

Sherlock

Matthew Yglesias used the fact that Zephram Cochrane is projected to master faster than light travel by the 2060s to explain long term budget projections. I’m glad he explains economics in terms I understand.

The first half season of Caprica will be released on DVD in October.

Producer Scott Rosenbaum agrees the first season of V was inconsistent. The original series started out much better, but went downhill over time. Hopefully in the case of the remake we will see an upwards trajectory.

Julie Benz

Julie Benz gave revealed how Rita will be returning to the first episode of the upcoming season of Dexter along with talking about her upcoming role on No Ordinary Family.

Amy Pond might have only come in second place in the rankings above, but she did get to go Over The Rainbow:

Great video but there is one important scene missing. Here’s one more video with Karen Gillan before concluding: Something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue:

Changes For Three TV Dads: Dexter Morgan, Don Draper, & Ted Mosby

There’s major changes this season for three TV dads: Dexter Morgan, Donald Draper, and Ted Mosby. Some hints as to how Rita’s murder has affected Dexter can be seen in the trailer above which was first released at San Diego Comic Con. Warning, the trailer and this post contain spoilers.

The upcoming season takes place immediately after the events of the last season. Rita’s murder is bound to affect how Dexter takes action against other murderers and there are reports that Julie Benz  will be appearing next season. I don’t know if this will be in flash backs, scenes of a dead Rita talking with Dexter as Dexter speaks with his dead father, or if she will be used in some other way.

Dexter Rita's Funeral

There are reports that there will not be a new romantic interest for Dexter so soon after Rita’s death. There will also not be a single major villain for Dexter to cope with and instead there will be a number of story lines. Nobody could compete with John Lithgow’s portrayal of Trinity, and it might be best to not even try to compete with that this soon.

As can be seen in the trailer, Quinn is suspicious of Dexter, and he gets Deb to look at him differently. In the books Deb found out about Dexter’s secret hobby. Dexter seems to confess to Rita’s murder in the trailer, but from the rest of the information available this is clearly misleading. Rumor also has it that the police have another suspect in mind–Kyle Butler!

Don Draper Mad Men

The new season of Mad Men has already begun (full episode on line here), and the story has jumped ahead one year after Don has both lost Betty and is involved in starting up a new advertising company. Personally Don is doing far worse than I’d have predicted. Instead of having lots of girl friends a year later, he is resorting to  hiring a prostitute. Perhaps Don is capable of easily getting involved in purely sexual affairs while married, but is having difficulty getting involved in a true relationship now that he is single. It probably has not helped Don’s ego that he lost Betty after she found out about his unimpressive background.

In some ways the prostitute seemed more normal than Don as she spoke of having to leave early to spend Thanksgiving with her family. Even stranger, Don was paying her to hit him. Maybe he’d be happier with Madeline Zima’s character on Californication who is into such things.

Instead of renting a fancy bachelor pad in midtown, Don has moved to an apartment Greenwich Village which does not appear to be of the quality that would be expected from a successful advertising executive. Perhaps it is where Don thinks that Dick Whitman belongs. Professionally Don seemed down at the start but has made a come back by the end of the episode, as seen with the differences between his two interviews.

Beyond the changes to Don, the episode had Peggy and Joey repeatedly referring to John and Marsha. I previously discussed the meaning of these scenes here.

Rachel Bilson with Ted Mosley on How I Met Your Mother

Ted Mosley will be moving towards the eventual conclusion of series on How I Met Your Mother. Rachel Bilson, who we know is the room mate of the eventual mother of Ted’s children, will be returning but I suspect we will not actually see the room mate until a later date. We should be moving towards finding out her eventual identity, and reportedly next season puts an end to the game of having every female Ted meets be a suspect for his eventual wife.

Things might also not be entirely over for Ted and Robin. I even wonder at times if they are playing an elaborate game with the viewers. The first episode was written to give the impression that Robin was Ted’s eventual wife, but the episode concluded with Ted telling his children that it was the story of how he met “Aunt Robin.” Since then to recurring question is whether every girl he meets is the actual one with Robin supposedly not being fated to be Ted’s wife.

How I Met Your Mother

Ted did date Robin for a while and the two eventually broke up. I’ve wondered, however, if Robin doesn’t eventually become Ted’s wife in that future we’ve seen very limited scenes of. There are several ways, such as death or divorce, in which Ted could have been married to someone else, have the children, and still wind up married to Robin at the time Ted is talking to  his kids. An even more bizarre situation would be if Robin is the mother but some reason is developed to have them claim that someone else is the mother.

A recurring story line will involve having Ted working on a project involving the Goliath National Bank building. A new character will be opposing the development. Is there any doubt that if a new female character is brought in to be Ted’s new nemesis he will also try to date her?

In other developments during the season, Barney meets his father–and it is not Bob Barker. Marshall and Lily proceed with plans to have a child, but there will be complications along the way.

SciFi Weekend: Dexter Spoilers; Matt Smith; Fringe; Sheldon With His Pants Down

The season finale for Dexter resulted in major changes for the show. One question I wondered about after the finale was whether they would pick up next season with Rita’s murder and deal with the immediate ramifications or jump ahead. Ausiello has some spoilers as to what will happen next season:

Season 5 will pick up right where season 4 left off.
“We have spent the last month sitting around, talking and really debating how best to deal with the aftermath of [Rita’s death]. We uniformly decided that we don’t want to jump ahead. We need to see Dexter go through the process that we’d all have to go through if such a horrible thing had happened to us. We need to see him doing everything from the big emotional things like grieving the loss, to the mundane things like arranging a funeral, getting the kids dressed, and all the other things that are usually done for men because their wives or mothers do them. They have no idea how to handle all of these things. As we saw, Rita was really the caretaker of their baby. It would be cheating the audience of their catharsis to not see Dexter go through that mourning period and see how it affects him or to not see him dealing with the blowback of what he essentially caused. So we will not jump to Harrison as a 5 year old yet.”

Season 5 may not feature a Trinity-esque villain.
“John Lithgow is a tough act to follow. If there was ever a year that we could take a step back from the Big Bad formula and go deeper into Dexter and his psychology, this would be that year. That said, Dexter has a dark passenger that won’t go away no matter how much he yearns to be normal. That rears up and needs to be dealt with. He may even dive deeper after this traumatic loss of Rita. We are working on a way that feels original and fresh and unique to what he has just gone through. It cannot be the way it has been before. In [Season 1], he was terrified of any kind of intimacy because intimacy equaled being discovered. Then he slowly realized he had a need to be known and he set up a family and tried the best he could to balance it all. And now, he sees what being known brings him and he had it ripped out from underneath him suddenly and that will have some affect on him.”

Dexter will remain single… for now.
“Anything is possible, but I don’t think Dexter will be in the mood for dating or love anytime soon. That’s not even on our radar right now. He very much loved Rita and they were in a good place right before she was killed so that wound will take quite some time to heal.”

Julie Benz has been doing well despite Rita’s fate. She is appearing on several episodes of Desperate Housewives as a stripper this season and has signed to play a fast woman in a pilot for next season. She will star in No Ordinary Family, a drama that about a family that suddenly develops special abilities. Her character will have super speed.

The Guardian interviewed Matt Smith about his staring role in Doctor Who:

He talks about how tough the work is, and the hours they have to put in. “By the end, we’ll be filming from 11pm till nine in the morning… then they need to shoot in the mornings because of the light. D’you know what? It is exhausting. We’ve been shooting for seven and a half months now, and the line-learning is quite immense for the Doctor because he’s in pretty much every scene, and he says the majority of stuff because his brain is the coolest and the biggest.” After filming, he does a couple of hours a night of revision, learning his lines. Is it worse than school? “No, because you’re the Doctor, so the payoff’s greater. It’s not like triple maths with Mr Humzinger. There’s not that much coffee breath.”

When he got the job, he had to keep it secret. He’d sit watching Doctor Who with his flatmate, desperate to tell him he was the new Time Lord and having to keep schtum. “It was a complete nightmare.” Eventually he told his father. “He was rather flabbergasted. When I told him, he laughed. He was excited, elated and very proud.”

It’s such a strange time in his life. A year ago, he was pretty much unknown – fans of the television series Party Animals, in which he played a parliamentary researcher, or those who had seen him at the Royal Court in That Face, playing the carer son of Lindsay Duncan’s alcoholic mother, might have been able to put a name to the face, but he hardly had a mass following. At Christmas, he made his first (and so far only) appearance as the Doctor, when David Tennant regenerated into him. Today, he can just about get away with walking around unbothered. In a few weeks, he will be a star, one of the most recognisable actors in the country. “There aren’t many jobs that change the fabric of your life in the same way – where you go from being a working actor who is pretty anonymous, to being thrust into what is one of the most popular shows, if not the most popular, in Britain.”

Is he nervous? Look, he says, it’s his job, he’s taking it all in his stride. Then he stops. Of course he’s nervous. “It’s unlike any job I’ll ever do because a) there’s so much that comes with it, b) there’s so much that is expected. I’d be lying if I said the first day I walked on the beach, where we filmed, and I saw the Tardis, and there were all these paparazzi there, and you’re going, what the hell is going on…?” In his rush to get the words out, he often forgets to finish sentences.

Has he sought the advice of former Doctors? He tells me he recently had lunch with Peter Davison, who told him simply to enjoy the ride. He also had a word with David Tennant. “I spoke briefly to David. He was just very lovely and gave me encouragement, but I think you have to cleave it out yourself. It’s your own journey.”

Surely it makes it that bit tougher when he’s following the most popular Doctor ever. “Yeah, yeah. I guess you’ve got to approach it with your own take or spin. No, spin is the wrong word. Identity. How can you not be aware of the rich heritage and legacy? Over Christmas it was everywhere. It was the big thing, David leaving the show. But it only intimidates you as much as you allow it to.”

Even before knowing if Fringe would be renewed, J.J. Abrams was promising that this season’s finale would top last season’s finale:

“I think the whole alternate-universe idea is at the core of what’s going to be happening,” Abrams said earlier this week. “Without giving anything away, I think that the ending of this second season is richer and better and deeper than what we did last year.”

Fringe returns on April 1 with seven consecutive episodes. He had this to say about the first of these episodes:

“It’s one of my favorite episodes that we’ve done,” he said. “It is particularly retro and weird. It’s a really cool episode.”

The news finally came yesterday that Fringe has been renewed for a third season.

I don’t know exactly what is going on in this picture from an upcoming episode of Big Bang Theory but it appears that Sheldon might have won an award and that he somehow lost his pants. I suspect alcohol might be involved. Even stranger, it appears that Penny took Sheldon out shopping for suit he is almost wearing:

The TV Addict has additional pictures.

Update: A glass ceiling has been broken at the Academy Awards. This was the first Oscar win for a Star Trek movie. Barney Burman, Mindy Hall and Joel Harlow have won the Academy Award for best make up.

SciFi Weekend: Lost Premiere; Heroes Finale; Neil Gaiman Writing For Doctor Who; Julie Benz Remains on Wisteria Lane

LA X, the season premiere of Lost, gave two answers for what happened after the bomb went off. The show first showed a scene aboard Oceanic Flight 815 in which the plane did not crash on the island. The real surprise here was that more changed than just the fate of the characters we have been following. The entire island was under water.

Rather than alternating between present and flashbacks, the show alternated with views of one reality in which the plane did not crash and another in which the explosion threw everyone from the past to 2007 after the hatch was blown up. It is not clear why an explosion would do this as opposed to either changing the time line or killing everyone, but this is Lost.

In what might be another key scene, Juliet had some last words: “It worked.” I take this to mean that the other time line is equally real as the one on the island but wonder how Juliet would know this. If it was Desmond I would have an easier time seeing how a character would be seeing two different realities.  As we’ve often seen the dead interacting with the living, perhaps being near death is what allowed Juliet to see both realities.

The episode reveals more about the smoke monster, showing it is also the Man in Black. Questions remain as to his actual role and relationship to Jacob. I’ve seen reports that his actual nemesis is someone other than Jacob (who did not really seem to object to getting killed). The scene at the temple also revealed what happened to some of the passengers from Oceanic 815 who have not been seen in quite a while.

In the other reality we are reminded that, despite their eagerness to return home, many of the passengers were better off on the island. Jack’s life is still a mess, and now there’s the added complication that his father’s body is missing. I suspect that means he is still alive. Kate is on the run from the law (and reportedly Sawyer is a cop). Rose presumably still has cancer. Locke cannot walk, but perhaps he will take up Jack’s offer and be cured. One major difference is with Hugo who describes himself as the world’s luckiest man in this reality. TV Overmind has posted the above picture which also shows that Hugo had played a different set of numbers when he won the lottery. This returns to the question of the significance of the numbers. Perhaps Hurley’s luck all depended upon which numbers were played.

With the island under water people will be in different places in this reality. We already saw that Desmond is somehow still connected to the other passengers. With no hatch for him to be busy pushing the button in he wound up as another passenger on Oceanic 815. There’s no indication as to whether he is involved with Penny in this reality. Ben would be entirely different if he hadn’t lived on the island. Elizabeth Mitchell has a new show to keep her busy, but there are reports she will return as Juliet later in the season. It is not clear how she would interact with characters that in this reality she would not know (unless the two realities are merging together by then).

Tomorrow night is the season finale of Heroes. There has been talk that NBC plans to end the series but reportedly the episode was not written to be a series finale in the hopes that the series would be renewed.  I sure hope that they don’t end with a cliff hanger if the show is not returning. Masi Oka  told Fancast that possibly the episode could have been edited to be a series finale:

“They could probably edit it [to provide closure],” Masi Oka told me. “But whatever the case, I really hope that we get an opportunity to at least give the show a proper ending in one way or another. We want to pay respect to the fans who have been with us since Day 1.”

Neil Gaiman has verifed rumors that he is writing an episode of Doctor Who but it won’t be appearing until the second season under Steven Moffatt.  SFX reports:

In a special message sent to the SFX Weekender in his acceptance speech for winning Best Comic at the SFX Awards, Neil Gaiman has confirmed that he is writing an episode for the second Matt Smith season of Doctor Who.

Although not present personally, Neil Gaiman sent the following message:

“Over the years SFX, and its readers and their votes in the polls, have always been very kind to me. I thought I’d return the favour with what used to be called, in journalistic circles when I was a boy, a scoop.

As anyone who’s read my blog knows, I’m a big fan of a certain long-running British SF TV series. One that started watching — from behind the sofa — when I was three. And while I know it’s cruel to make you wait for things, in about 14 months from now, which is to say, NOT in the upcoming season but early in the one after that, it’s quite possible that I might have written an episode. And if I had, it would originally have been called “The House of Nothing”. But it definitely isn’t called that any more.

Countdown. You’ve got about 14 months.”

Julie Benz was originally signed to appear on three episodes of Desperate Housewives after she concluded her role on Dexter. TV Squad reports that her character was so well-received that she will be remaining longer. Their post gives some spoilers as to upcoming story lines.

SciFi Weekend: Dollhouse, Doctor Who, Lost; Star Trek; Dexter

Getting Closer, this week’s episode of Dollhouse, moved the story of the future forward while filling in major information as to the past. The last few episodes have been as if The X-Files was canceled during the second season and the entire mythology story was told in the final few episodes before it got hopelessly convoluted. (Warning: Major spoilers ahead.)

In The Attic we learned that two partners were behind Rossum, with one taking control and sending Clyde to the Attic.  Caroline knew the identity of the second partner and much of this week’s episode centered around an attempt to restore her memory. There were also many flash backs which filled in more of Caroline and Bennett’s (Summer Glau) back stories. The attempts to restore Caroline’s memory were disrupted by Caroline’s wedge being missing and by a doll who was programmed to kill one of the people who could recover the memory.

In the end viewers saw what Caroline saw three years ago and Clyde’s partner was  revealed to be Boyd. In retrospect it is clear that Boyd was responsible for both of the complications above.

The big question here is whether there is a satisfactory answer for Boyd being behind Rossum or if this is a shocker added at the last minute without good reason. Boyd has  been trying to prevent Caroline from recovering her memory while encouraging Echo’s development. Presumably next week’s episode will reveal exactly why Boyd wanted Echo challenging Rossum, while the series finale will be a follow up to Epitaph One.

The latest issue of Doctor Who Magazine (via Den of Geek) provides information on the writers for the upcoming season of Doctor Who. Steven Moffat reportedly will be writing six of the thirteen episodes including one story with the return of the Weeping Angels from Blink.  River Song (Alex Kingston from Silence In The Library) will also be in an episode. I previously posted a picture of Alex Kingston being filmed in an episode here. There is also information on the other writers:

Joining The Moff on the roster are some familiar Who names and also some new faces to the fold. Returnees include Mark Gatiss (The Unquiet Dead), Gareth Roberts (The Unicorn & The Wasp) and Toby Whithouse (School Reunion) who will take care of one episode each whilst Chris Chibnall (42) will pen a two-parter.

Whilst news that Richard Curtis had written an episode featuring Van Gogh ‘leaked’ some time ago (by Curtis himself), the last name may seem like a surprise to some. Simon Nye, best known for the sitcom Men Behaving Badly, has been brought on board for an installment of the series.

Slice of SciFi has some rumors on villains appearing next season. This includes the Daleks (in an episode with Winston  Churchill–I’ll have to search through his writings to see if their is any mention of this meeting). Others include the Cybermen (those from our own universe, not the ones from the alternative universe of season two), and the Silurians and/or Sea Devils from the Jon Pertwee era).

The White House has decided against a February 2 date for State of Union as the  final season of Lost is scheduled to begin that date: “I don’t foresee a scenario in which millions of people that would hope to finally get some conclusion in ‘Lost’ are preempted by the president,” Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said Friday.

Executives at Disney/ABC see Lost as too big a money-maker to give up and are now talking about a sequel to Lost after it finishes its run this year. Didn’t Disney learn their lesson from those dreadful Cinderella sequels? While maybe not the same, I fear that any attempts to continue Lost beyond the story’s conclusion would be a huge mistake.

The Star Trek sequel is tentatively set for release on May 29, 2012. I’m relieved that we have a chance to see it before the world comes to an end (per the Mayan calendar).

What happens after you are killed and go to the after life? If you are Julie Benz you wind up on Wisteria Lane. Dexter’s murdered wife has started filming on Desperate Housewives. Does that make Wisteria Lane Heaven or Hell?

SciFi Weekend: Dexter Finale Tonight

This has probably been the best season of Dexter yet thanks to John Lithgow’s portrayal of the Arthur Mitchell and the many twists this season. Twists include finding that, just as the Foundation and Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Trilogies wound up having more than three books, the cycle of the Trinity killer contains four rather than three killings. Last week’s key twists including the suicide of Christine after confessing to shooting Lundy and Debra, and the ending in which Mitchell discovers  Dexter’s identity.

Even bigger twists are likely to be present tonight. Julie Benz (Rita) has hinted at a shocking ending. Jennifer Carpenter, Michael C. Hall’s wife in real life and sister Debra on the show, has also said that Dexter will never be the same and warns that “maybe all of our trailers won’t be there next year.” She also hinted at changes in an interview with E!

Give it to us straight. How good is the season finale?
I have to give a lot of our fans credit. The stuff that they come up with and the guesses that they make on how it’s going to end are really impressive, but you just can’t top our writers. All the time you put in [episodes] one through 11 watching the show, you’ll be glad that you did in 12. Everybody matters in the end. Everybody matters. We all had to be there to shoot the finale.

How does it set up season five?
At the end of every season, collectively, the writers, the producers, the actors, we all sort of cry, “What are we gonna do next year?” And this season it ended and everybody said, “Well, what can’t we do next year?” I know the mold is sort of breaking and that’s an exciting thing. I think people are kind of getting comfortable sitting in their living rooms with a serial killer, and my hope is to make him more dangerous.

Will Deb find out about Dexter’s mom? It seems like she’s getting close.
They’ve been sort of unraveling that cord for four years now, so I can’t say that anything is finished. That’s sort of the brilliance of the finale and the twisted psyche of our writers. It’s sort of epic and vast, and it all counts. I feel like a lot of viewers are waiting for the big payoff, the big reveal when Deb finds out, but I think it will be more exciting and feel more dangerous if the blanket’s not just ripped off the secret, if it’s slowly discovered. So I guess we’ll all get there someday.

Do you think Deb will ever discover Dexter’s big secret, that he’s a serial killer?
Personally, being a player in this game, I want to see it happen, partly, just because I’m curious. I think I know Deb as well as anyone, and I think they [the writers] would claim to know her just as well, and I’m interested to see if we’re all on the same page about what it would look like. We all throw around ideas just for fun when we’re waiting on-set, or even after when we’re on hiatus and all hanging out as friends we all say, “Well, what if this happened?” and “What if that happened?” And I have real responses to what people say. I get angry about it; I get hurt about it. I get protective of it. So I’m ready to go in any direction that they tell me to move, but I don’t think you can tease an audience the way we have about her getting close to it without giving them the payoff, whatever it is.

Whatever is going to happen tonight, Showtime has taken extreme precautions to avoid it leaking out:

Word is, there will be a turn so unexpected on Sunday that it will change the whole series.

Not surprising, considering this is “Dexter” we’re talking about and the season has been loaded with twists.

A finale that doesn’t trump what’s already gone down would probably be considered a disappointment by fans.

But if the intense measures that Showtime has taken to protect the secrecy of what’s in store are any indication, there’s not much for viewers to worry about.

We’re told non-disclosure agreements were signed by everyone on staff and at the network, decoy scripts were drafted and disseminated, each and every screener was watermarked and sets were closed to anyone that didn’t absolutely have to be around during shooting.

It is quite possible that whatever happens is totally different from the ideas I’ve speculated on during the season. The writers really do seem to be well ahead of the fans. Considering the degree to which Rita has hindered Dexter this season, I wonder if she winds up getting killed by Trinity, or winds up leaving Dexter. Perhaps she’ll discover his secret. The character who is even more likely to figure it out is Debra, perhaps as a consequence of both going after the same killer. In the clip above she has learned a little more about Dexter’s past. In the first novel, which was similar to the first season of Dexter, Debra did wind up learning Dexter’s secret.

The success of this season is largely due to John Lithgow’s portray of Arthur Mitchell, the Trinity killer. There is really no point in even bothering to nominate anyone else this season for best supporting actor in a drama. In the above video, Harry Smith interviewed John Lithgow about playing the role. The video includes a short clip from the finale which gives a clue as to what happens during the confrontation between Dexter and Arthur at the conclusion of last week’s episode.

If Arthur wasn’t creepy enough when seen caring out the murders, he was shown to be even sicker in the scenes with his family. This clip from the finale shows yet another incident between Arthur and his family:Update: I’d been expecting this for several weeks (as I predicted here) and the episode certainly foreshadowed such a development (unless you really believed Dexter was just going to settle down). Showtime certainly had a great night with cliff hangers, both on Dexter and Californication. Both endings should increase interest in next season.