TVSquad

Despite a lengthy hiatus in the middle of its third season due to that pesky WGA Strike, and a shift to Friday nights, it was reported at Comic-Con that Syfy has renewed Eureka for a fourth season. And not one of those crappy 12- or 13-episode seasons we usually get on cable. This is a full 22 episodes, for which I say ... well, that would be a bit obvious, wouldn't it?

The good news is that the absence didn't hurt the show at all. It's just as compelling as it ever was. And fun. By fun, of course, I mean for us. Poor Sheriff Carter seems on the verge of a nervous breakdown half the time. Between negotiating a teenage daughter and the geniuses and their dangerously inventive concoctions, it's a wonder Eureka hasn't been blown off the map. Maybe for the series finale.

Even better, if you've yet to add it to your weekly list of stops, you can catch the latest four episodes of Eureka streaming on Hulu, along with tons of other fun clips.

It's been a long time (almost a year at this point) since Sci Fi's surprise hit Eureka has been on the air. The show, a casualty of last year's writers strike and this year's recession woes, returns next Friday, July 10 at 9 PM with the final 10 episodes of season 3.

Series star Colin Ferguson and co-creator Jamie Paglia spoke to reporters on a media call and dished a little dirt on all the mid-season drama that's coming up. After the jump we'll get into Sheriff Carter finally having a "real honest love interest," the possibility of two well-liked characters making a re-appearance on the show, and, sadly, the one face that we won't be seeing (at all) around Eureka. Just a heads up to serious spoiler-phobes, there's an answer to at least one question you may want to avoid.

The word of the day at the Eureka panel on Saturday was 'awesome'. For some apparent reason everyone on the panel ended their sentences with the word 'awesome'. That, and a mention about doing their scenes in towels. That was actually an on-going joke coming from a revelation that the stars and writers presented to the audience as something that will be coming up during season three.

Of course there's more than just certain people walking around in towels coming up n the new season, and the panel let the audience in on what they would see when the show premieres this Tuesday. You can find out as well after the jump.

(S01E03) Nope, this isn't Eureka, and that isn't the friendly Sheriff Carter up there. But it is Eureka's Colin Ferguson, and with Clifton Collins Jr. he has created a truly chilling installment in NBC's increasingly "must see" horror anthology Fear Itself. Well, much of the credit to the success of this episode belongs at the feet of Dan Knauf, who proved himself an absolute master of the macabre with his darkly brilliant HBO series Carnivále. He's also been a writer for Supernatural, so this stuff is clearly old hat for him.

And I'm pleased to say that the "old pro" really came through with "Family Man." Easily the best episode of the young season so far and one of the best stand-alone hours of any anthology series I think I've ever seen. Ferguson, who we've come to know and love for playing the nice guy really shines here. And due to the complexity of the story, both he and Collins get a real chance to flex their acting muscles to brilliant effect. From the chilling scenes at home to the overwhelming drama in the prison, each moment propelled the story forward. The only thing that blows me away is that director Ronny Yu, who does wonderfully here, has Freddy vs. Jason and Bride of Chucky as his horror directing pedigree.

From The Twilight Zone to Amazing Stories, anthologies have always tried to find a home on television. But where once they were embraced and even lauded, now they struggle to find viewers and usually only eke out a season or so. Last summer brought us Masters of Science Fiction, which itself was a variation on the pay cable Masters of Horror, which proved the more successful of the pair. Horror has always had a special place in our hearts.

And so it is not tremendously surprising that NBC is back in the game, this time with Fear Itself, an hour-long horror anthology. The series premieres Thursday, June 5 at 10pm ET, and I'm going to tell you now to try not to judge it by the first episode. I got a chance to preview the first three episodes, and for me it got better with each installment. Maybe it's a bias against the fairly typical "monster of the week" storytelling that has weakened episodes of such otherwise good shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Smallville and Supernatural.

(S02E13) Will is off this week, headed to Talladega to cheer on his beloved Earnhardt Jr and the #8 Budweiser Chevrolet, or something like that. He asked that I take over Eureka, so here I am. Before we get to the actual episode though, I wanted to bring up a comment that TV Squad reader Derek made on last week's post.

He mentioned his growing annoyance with the formula of Eureka. I think it's a fair criticism. It hasn't worn on me yet, but we all react differently to these things, which is part of what makes it all so fun. I bring it up though, because I think it highlights what is a difficult balancing act for a show like this. If a show gets too wrapped up in an ongoing story, it runs the risk of alienating viewers who think it's all a big stall game. Please see every Lost post on the internet for an example. On the other hand, not enough serialization, and it gets formulaic, annoying an entirely different group. It's something that I think team Eureka has balanced well this season, but your mileage may vary. Anyway, after the jump, a look at the big season finale.

Aaaand we're back with part two of the Eureka panel discussion at the Sci Fi Digital Press tour in Vancouver. I've got to say that I'm very glad we got the DVDs of these panels, not only so I can share them with you but because I can check them out again myself. In some respects you can kind of take these things for granted, then I step back and realize that these guys came out and took time to sit down and talk to us, the fans. You can still check out the first part of this video.

Enjoy the rest of the panel video below!

Eureka! Ahem... Wahoo! I got the Eureka panel interview DVD working, and was able to get the first part embedded for you below. I was definitely impressed by the energy and commitment of the cast and crew for this show, and Neil Grayston was awesome enough to have taken the time to show us around the "smart house" set and even give us a demonstration of his SARAH voice (you'd have to know the show to know what I mean).

Thanks to Colin Furguson, Erica Cerra, Salli Richardson, Joe Morton, Ed Quinn, Neil Grayston and Mark Stern for putting up with us sci-fi geeks.

Once again, I'll be posting more on this and the others shows we visited in the coming days. Look for part two of this panel video later today.

2006 was a good year for television, but then all years are good years for television. Nostalgia often makes us think that things were better way back when, but I wouldn't trade my hundreds of channels of digital cable for the three networks on the rabbit ears for anything. Even the somewhat obscure channels like The-N (South of Nowhere), GSN (High Stakes Poker), and IFC (Henry Rollins Show) manage to bring some good stuff to the table. Of course, things are never all rosey, but we'll get to that later. First, some of the best things about TV this past year.

NBC's handling of Studio 60 and Friday Night Lights - Many of us, myself included, are quick to jump on the networks when they dump a show just a few episodes in. So it's worth acknowledging that the network has been more than patient with these two shows. Many shows that have come before them have been blown right off the schedule for generating similar ratings. Studio 60 kicked off their season with ratings that declined week after week and, honestly, Friday Night Lights just never had any ratings to begin with. I really hope their patience pays off and audiences find these shows. They both deserve to see a second season.

Good news everyone. SciFi has announced that Eureka will be coming back for a second season. They have ordered 13 more episodes which are set to begin production in the spring. The series will return with all new episodes next summer. Based on the numbers, this was a slam dunk decision for the network. According to the press release, Eureka is SciFi's highest rated, most watched show of 2006. Not only that, it outperformed the previous year's time slot average by +175%. The detail that really surprised me though... Tuesday's Eureka finale beat the CW's Veronica Mars premiere in males 18-49 and males 25-54. Confirmed to be returning for the second season are Colin Ferguson, Salli Richardson-Whitfield, Joe Morton, Jordan Hinson, Ed Quinn, Debrah Farentino and Matt Frewer. I'm a little disturbed that they didn't mention Erica Cerra there, but hopefully that's just an over-site.