TVSquad

From March 14th to March 27th, The Paley Center for Media is presenting the twentieth-fifth annual William S. Paley Television Festival. The Paley Center, formerly the Museum of Television and Radio, says that the festival celebrates "television's rich and diverse programming and the creative process behind the medium." This year the festival includes Chuck, Friday Night Lights, Pushing Daisies, and Gossip Girl among others.

Last night, I attended the Buffy the Vampire Slayer reunion. For what happened during the panel discussion and some pictures, read on past the jump...

As Brad mentioned last night, a few new projects were mentioned during the Sci Fi Channel's upfront presentation. The one I'm most excited about (though at the same time frightened by) is the Battlestar Galactica spin-off, Caprica, which will have a two-hour "back-door pilot" shown probably later this year.

Another project mentioned which surprised me was Alice, described as a "modern day telling of Alice in Wonderland," much like Tin Man was for The Wizard of Oz. What surprised me about this is how Mark Stern, executive vice president of original programming for Sci Fi, reacted when I actually asked him about this idea last year during my visit to the sets in Vancouver.

Sarah Michelle Gellar says that she doesn't think she could ever do a one hour series again because it is too exhausting. The former Buffy star goes on to say, "A movie is an hour and twenty minutes, and we were filming almost that every week." By almost that she means 45 minutes. It's possible that she may have vowed to never take another math class at some point too.

I don't put a lot of weight behind her proclamation though. Sarah Michelle is having a good run of it with the movies right now. With The Grudge 2 in theaters, three other movies in post-production, and two more in pre-production, her plate is awfully full. And I am really looking forward to Alice. Still, those runs have a way of drying up, and we have seen all manner of movie stars come back to the small screen. A few years from now maybe, if the choice is random drama on random network or Scooby Doo 5, TV might look pretty good.

Related:
Unaired Buffy pilot on YouTube
Mercedes McNab's Playboy shoot - NSFW
Retro Squad reviews Buffy season one

(S01E19) Sanctuary, on a personal level, is where we perform the job of taking care of our soul. -- Christopher Forrest McDowell

The consequences of Faith's actions during the last episode are coming to fruition, and there are a number of people who aren't happy with her. Let's take a look at who wants a piece of the slightly insane slayer.

1. Wolfram & Hart -- Considering the fact that the law firm hired Faith to get rid of Angel, they're a bit miffed at her not fulfilling the contract. So, they hire another assassin to eliminate both Angel and Faith at the same time. Unfortunately, the assassin who was hired to kill the assassin who was hired to kill Angel failed at his task as well.

(S01E08) Cordelia: Batten down the hatches, here comes Hurricane Buffy!

For the last two months (has it been that long already?) I've been pretty much praising the first season episodes of Angel. While still having ties to the Buffyverse, it was working its way to becoming something different and, dare I say it, a bit more sophisticated than Buffy the Vampire Slayer. And, the last seven episodes showed growing inner strength and maturity in the characters.

The eighth episode? Well, not so much of that strength and maturity. In fact, it actually seemed that both Angel and Cordelia took a big step backwards in their character development all because Buffy Anne Summers decided to show up in Los Angeles. Thanks loads, Slayer!

If I were fellow blogger Keith, I would be writing this article from a totally different angle. I would probably be doing cartwheels at the thought of a Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie, written and directed by Joss Whedon. Alas, I missed the boat when it came to Buffy, so today's news breaks my heart. An article in the latest Entertainment Weekly with Joss Whedon says he has come to terms with the fact that there won't be any more Firefly movies.  Serenity only made $25 million in the United States and it's not yet clear how well the DVD will do (it went on sale this week). But, that amount of money isn't enough for Universal to launch a franchise of films. Sigh.