When you're bombarded with one panel after the other, it's sometimes hard to figure out how to group them together. One writer I was sitting with at the BBC America panel, for instance, was blogging each individual panel, and was such a frantic blur of writing and Photoshopping that she developed what can best be described as SCTS (Sudden Carpal Tunnel Syndrome).
You gotta do what you gotta do, I guess. Me, I figured that there were three panels that could be put in what I call the "Comic-Con group": Spartacus on Starz, and Doctor Who and Being Human on BBC America. These shows got extensive showcases in San Diego over the weekend, and there wasn't many details revealed in any of these panels that you wouldn't have heard over the din at SDCC. So I'm going to go over the three of them in brief after the jump.
Let me give you a good teaser: If you were on the fence about seeing Spartacus, the prospect of a naked Lucy Lawless may convince you.
If this trailer, straight from Comic-Con International, is any indication, then January 2010 can't come soon enough! The 13-episode Starz (You read that right, Starz!) series Spartacus: Blood and Sand boasts Sam Raimi (Spider-Man), Rob Talpert (Drag Me to Hell) and Steven S. DeKnight (Smallville) executive producing. It features Lucy Lawless (Xena: Warrior Princess), Peter Mensa (300) and Erin Cummings (Dollhouse).
Everything about this trailer makes the show look amazing. Amazing costuming, good casting and dialogue. The effects style borrows heavily from the hyper-realism of 300, which adds a great dramatic flare. Damn, what more can I say? Just watch the thing and wait with bated breath until January like me.
The folks at our sister site Cinematical are working hard to give you news and reviews of the best -- and worst -- the silver screen has to offer. Here are some of their musings on the latest blockbusters, indies, and everything in between:
I'm always up for a good Dwight Schrute bobblehead, but a Terminator one? I'm not sure I really get the appeal there.
Apparently fans have been up in arms about Jonah Hill remaking 21 Jump Street, saying that he was going to make it into a comedy. I loved 21 Jump Street, and I had no idea it wasn't a comedy already.
Cinematical is even suggesting you make it a double-feature weekend, seeing both Drag Me to Hell and Pixar's latest film, Up. Having seen Up, I highly recommend this. It is an amazing movie that will have you in tears throughout the entire thing (but was still really funny!).
As far as I can figure, I've been sitting here on my couch for 60 minutes, and my TV is trying to drag my eyeballs to their death.
It wasn't always like this. I had a real job with a real salary and real health expenses that would pay for glasses when my eyes were weakened by the incandescent glow of a television that could ruin the vision of a night owl.
My TV Squad editor sent my TV and I to a small network in the UHF channels. A producer had come to a remote cabin in the woods to create his latest reality show project, 13: Fear is Real. Bound in flashy camera tricks and dipped in sappy horror movie cliches, this reality show contained bizarre challenges, petty altercations, and a demonic, unoriginal mastermind who tortures and watches over all. It was never meant for the watching.
The producer released something dark on the network, something ... awful.
Director Sam Raimi, the man who created such gut-wrenching horrors as The Evil Dead trilogy and Spider Man 3, takes his talent for disemboweling innocent people and chopping off limbs with a dull ax to television ... for a reality show?!?
13 - Fear is Real premieres tonight January 7 on The CW at 8 p.m. eastern. It puts 13 innocent (not really) people in the middle of a fake horror movie, and the last one standing on their bloody stumps takes home the grand prize.
The reality show aims to do for horror movies what Next Action Star did for action movies - rip them off and turn them into another schlock reality show that requires little to no creative ideas or thought.
The folks at our sister site Cinematical are working hard to give you news and reviews of the best -- and worst -- the silver screen has to offer. Here are some of their latest musings on the latest blockbusters, indies, and everything in between. Since today is Halloween, I chose my favorite posts about the holiday:
Freddy Krueger: Registered Offender. This Halloween, we take the time to reflect on what it would be like if a horribly-disfigured man who kills children in their dreams moves into your neighborhood.
Do you have an idea for your own Halloween movie (or any other film, for that matter)? If so, Details magazine wants to hear it. Find out how you can pitch them your idea and get your movie made.
It may not be a horror movie, but it does open on Halloween and I am super-stoked: Zack and Miri Make a Porno finally opens! Check out Cinematical's interviews with Kevin Smith.
Wow, "syndicated adventure series." Whatever happened to all of those cheesy syndicated adventure shows that used to dot the television landscape? There used to be dozens of them on the weekends and late at night. Sitcoms too. There aren't too many of them anymore, replaced by reality, home improvement, court shows, and talk shows, or not replaced at all.
It's taken a couple years, as we first posted about the series in August 2006, but Sam Raimi's adaptation of the Terry Goodkind books will finally be beaming into our televisions the weekend of November 1, 2008. That's about as specific as anyone can be, because this is a syndicated series. We'll all have to check our local listings. The good news though, is that Disney-ABC says they have cleared the show in 95% of the country.
The press release mentions that Raimi and his partners, Rob Tapert, Joshua Donen, Ned Nalle, and Kenneth Biller are the team behind Xena: Warrior Princess and Hercules: The Legendary Journeys. Why they continue to excise Cleopatra 2525 from that list remains a mystery to me.
The series will kick off with a two-hour premiere and Raimi describes it by saying, "The amazing characters and heartfelt story, combined with the captivating backdrop of New Zealand, will have viewers on the edge of their seats." I'm pretty much in the bag for anything Raimi is involved in, so I'll be watching. Wizard's First Rule could be that something to watch on Saturday night we're all looking for.
A day hasn't gone by where we haven't received some sort of tip or email asking us, the TV Squad, how to get on [insert reality show here]. Unfortunately no, Simon Cowell does not work for us, and Donald Trump isn't my BFF, so we really can't help all that much.
The folks at RealityWanted.com often send us a list of new and existing reality shows that are looking for new, er, talent, and they've given us permission to make mention of them here. We'll try to make this a regular feature as often as we get a new list.
This time we have Trading Spaces, The Newlywed Game and other new shows.
Spider-Man's director is going real. Reality TV that is. After nearly two years of talking with the CW about this project, Sam Raimi is prepping a summer reality series called 13. Considering Raimi's unique vision, as seen in the Spider-Man movies and other features like Darkman and Evil Dead, you have to hope that he'll bring something fresh to a genre as played out as reality.
Raimi with co-executive produce the eight-episodes of 13 with a renown reality producer, Jay Bienstock (Survivor and The Apprentice). Also attached is Robert Tapert, Sam's Ghost House Productions partner.
Poor Robert Jordan. I was sure his The Wheel of Time series would be the first modern fantasy series to make the leap to ongoing television series. But not only did George R.R. Martin's much newer A Song of Ice and Fireget picked up by HBO last year to be made into a series (what's the status on that?), now it looks like Terry Goodkind beat him to the punch, too.
Sam Raimi (Spider-Man) is teaming with ABC/Disney on 22 hour-long episodes chronicling Goodkind's The Sword of Truth eleven volume series, though the working title of the show appears to be the title of the first novel only: Wizard's First Rule. Intended for syndication, Rule will be the first major fantasy syndicated series since the likes of Hercules and Xena ruled the airwaves in the late '90s.
I'm not a fan of most "big" movies. You know, those movies with a ton of special effects, babes and explosions but very little plot? However, that doesn't mean decent "big" movies don't exist, and I think the Spider-Man films are a good example. Also, nobody brings a comic book to life better than Sam Raimi (perhaps some of my comic book-loving readers will disagree, though).
Anyway, I mention Spidey on this TV blog because FX has garnered the rights to broadcast Spider-Man 3 in 2009. How much FX ends up paying for the movie depends on how much money the movie itself brings in. As of this writing, the movie has brought in $161,401,784. The deal between Sony and FX could also allow Sony to sell the film to other broadcast networks.
Just out of curiosity, who saw Spider-Man 3 and what did you think of it? I liked it quite a bit, though I think it's probably the least of the series so far: a little too much story for one movie, but it did maintain that "old comic book" feel I love so much. I have a lot more to say about it, but I'll turn it over to you guys in the comments. Opine.
Here's the question I now have to ask myself: if Sam Raimi, a director who has made some of my favorite films of all time, decides to produce a reality series, a genre I despise and always avoid, what do I do? What, oh what, do I do? Hopefully I'll find out soon, because that's exactly what he's planning, along with his old producing partner, Robert Tapert. The duo are creating House of Horrors for the CW network, a reality series in which contestants will live in a house where they must face their fears, with contestants being killed off (not literally) in cool ways. Raimi did not come up with the concept, the show is actually the brainchild of Gunnar Witterberg. Raimi and Tapert are on board as executive producers, however. The show could possibly hit the airwaves by next summer.
Sam Raimi, director of the Spider-Man and Evil Dead films, as well as producer of popular syndicated series such as Xena and Hercules, recently secured the film rights to author Terry Goodkind's eleven-volume Sword of Truth series. Development of the first part of the lengthy mini-series, based on the first book in the series, Wizard's First Rule, will begin as Raimi wraps up production on Spider-Man 3. The final volume of Goodkind's fantasy series is slated for release in 2008, and more information on the TV adaptation will be available early next year. I've read very little fantasy in my lifetime, but are any of you fans of Goodkind? What do you think of this collaboration?
When you're bombarded with one panel after the other, it's sometimes hard to figure out how to group them together. One writer I was sitting with at the BBC America panel, for instance, was blogging each individual panel, and was such a frantic blur of writing and Photoshopping that she developed what can best be described as SCTS (Sudden Carpal Tunnel Syndrome).
If this trailer, straight from 
The folks at our sister site 
Director Sam Raimi, the man who created such gut-wrenching horrors as The Evil Dead trilogy and Spider Man 3, takes his talent for disemboweling innocent people and chopping off limbs with a dull ax to television ... for a reality show?!?
The folks at our sister site 
It sounds like the title of an mid-90s game show on Nickelodeon, but it's actually the title of a 
It's taken a couple years, as 
A day hasn't gone by where we haven't received some sort of tip or email asking us, the TV Squad, how to get on [insert reality show here]. Unfortunately no, Simon Cowell does not work for us, and Donald Trump isn't my BFF, so we really can't help all that much. 
Spider-Man's director is going real. Reality TV that is. After nearly two years of talking with the CW about this project, 
Poor Robert Jordan. I was sure his The Wheel of Time series would be the first modern fantasy series to make the leap to ongoing television series. But not only did George R.R. Martin's much newer 
I'm not a fan of most "big" movies. You know, those movies with a ton of special effects, babes and explosions but very little plot? However, that doesn't mean decent "big" movies don't exist, and I think the Spider-Man films are a good example. Also, nobody brings a comic book to life better than Sam Raimi (perhaps some of my comic book-loving readers will disagree, though).
Here's the question I now have to ask myself: if Sam Raimi, a director who has made some of my favorite films of all time, decides to produce a reality series, a genre I despise and always avoid, what do I do? What, oh what, do I do? Hopefully I'll find out soon, because that's exactly what he's planning, along with his old producing partner, Robert Tapert. The duo are creating House of Horrors for the CW network, a reality series in which contestants will live in a house where they must face their fears, with contestants being killed off (not literally) in cool ways. Raimi did not come up with the concept, the show is actually the brainchild of Gunnar Witterberg. Raimi and Tapert are on board as executive producers, however. The show could possibly hit the airwaves by next summer.
Sam Raimi, director of the Spider-Man and Evil Dead films, as well as producer of popular syndicated series such as Xena and Hercules, recently secured the film rights to author Terry Goodkind's eleven-volume 
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