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"Lorena Gale passed away on Sunday after a brief but courageous battle with stomach cancer. Her husband John was by her side. A wonderful actress and a lovely person, Lorena's many credits included the Ten Thirteen productions "The X-Files," "Millennium" and "The X-Files: I Want To Believe." In lieu of flowers the family asks that donations be made to Vancouver General Hospital's Palliative Care Unit. She will be greatly missed."
As most could have guessed from the tumultuous and confusing buildup to the premiere of Virtuality, the ratings for the night it aired seem to most likely the final catalyst to it's demise. It ranked 4th out of the 5 broadcast networks, but the debate goes on about whether it would have done better or worse had it aired the evening of July 4th, especially given the unforeseen events of Farrah and Micheal's deaths which sucked up viewers for that evening with special TV memorials on other networks. How about if Virtuality premiered in place of or before Dollhouse? Would it have had a chance? Does the fact that Ron has two projects involving a strong theme of virtual reality (Caprica and Virtuality), make one have to rule out the other? All tough and probably unanswerab;e questions.
Eddie had a little more to say about The Plan during the Saturn Awards, and apparently it will be a big surprise as far as what the Cylon plan really is... unless you read the spoiler within (Sci Fi Wire)! If you opt not to follow the link, it also mentions that Grace Park accepted the Saturn for Mary who couldn't make the event, and Grace and Eddie both commended each other for their work on The Plan.
Thankfully Virtuality is now on Hulu too. That Fox.com on Demand video player just doesn't wanna work for me. What an awesome show. I hope we get something more out of it and it doesn't just fall into the Fox dungeon of doom :\
And if you were wondering about the fate of Virtuality, co-producer and writer Michael Taylor explains to Sci Fi Wire about it's status as a "back door pilot":
"Fox is calling it a movie, but they want a lot of eyeballs on it too," Taylor added. "So we've conceived a whole season; we conceived multiple seasons. We know where this show is going, and it's going some really weird and interesting places. And that first season? Wow. It becomes an exciting thrill ride. It's a thriller, a story still about technology, it's a beautiful, crazy stew, and it's a hell of a ride."
Even though I had been long anticipating Virtuality, turns out my work schedule conflicted with actually watching it. Now, the day after it's air date, Virtuality is up to view online at Fox on Demand. I've had problems in the past viewing stuff on Fox.com, but they keep updating the player so maybe it's better now, and depending which browser you use.
Not only did Battlestar Galactica win the best in it's class, "Best Syndicated/Cable Television Series" at the 35th Annual Saturn Awards, but Mary McDonnell nabbed the Saturn for "Best Actress on Television", and Eddie Olmos won "Best Actor on Television", both for their work on BSG.
Collider.com was able to catch up with Eddie at the Awards:
It's actually the extended version of the teaser seen here, and this is what those who attended the Hollywood BSG Panel were shown a couple of weeks ago: (io9, LA Times):
Apparently the 12 minutes of footage from Virtuality (see previous post) spread around the web more quickly than in the form it was intended as. Sci Fi Wire points out that the Edge of Never: Life on Phaeton fictional reality series (is that confusing?) has been posted as webisode-style clips on this Edge of Never Facebook page. I haven't cross-referenced all of the clips on the Facebook page with the 12 minute clip, but it looks like it's mostly the same stuff, except strung together in the 12 minute clip. I find it unfortunate for FOX to have tried to create a sort of viral sensation tied to Virtuality, but now it just looks a little silly - The 12 minutes have been circling around the web since about the same date as the earliest post on the Facebook page, which only has 108 fans. It's still fun to get a glimpse at what the show will look like.
Topping the news today is word that Rick Worthy, aka Simon or Cylon skinjob number 4, has been signed on for a recurring role in season 4 of Heroes as "an experienced and capable Los Angeles cop and someone that Matt can lean on for advice"(Hollywood Reporter via IGN). If Rick will have any "special powers" beyond being a worthy partner for Parkman on the police force, will surely remain to be seen as the season unfolds. And yeah, Ray Parks will be in season 4 too!
And speaking of geek fantasies, and tying in with the cyborg docket at the Word Science Festival, Geekanerd has some handy tips for us: When Robots Attack: Three Robot Apocolypse Scenarios, and How To Avoid Them - In other words, in the case of the inevitable Robot apocalypse, we should be well prepared in "How to avoid being killed by Terminators, Machines, and Cylons".
Sam J. Miller had the privilege of interviewing Mary McDonnell previous to The World Science Festival panel. Awesome stuff. Thanks Sam J. Miller!
Are you ready for Virtuality next week - (June 26 at 8 p.m. ET/PT on FOX)? Here's a 12 minute preview (found at Den of Geek):
Interview clips from Sci Fi Wire on the red carpet at the Hollywood venue of the BSG UN panel:
We now have some coverage of the BSG Panel which took place at the 92nd Street Y in Manhattan as part of The World Science Festival. The event was called Battlestar Galactica: Cyborgs on the Horizon (see link for list of participants, which included cast members Mike Hogan and Mary McDonnell), and the discussion revolved around just what the title suggests - What place will cybernetics have in our future? Here's a roundup:
... and here's io9's write up, which includes some ideo clips and a description of a clip from the upcoming movie The Plan which hasn't been aired to the public as of yet!
Action Figure Insider updates with news of some coming additions to the Toys R Us exclusive Minimates line with BSG Mini-Flyers! There will be both a Mark VII Viper and Cylon Raider, and look for the exclusive editions of Starbuck's Viper and Scar at comic book stores near you! Also coming - a Tigh and Gaeta 2 pack. I believe these are part of the 12" figure line, and aren't exclusive to TRU.
Good old Crashdown. Okay, so maybe he wasn't so good in the end, but I think Sam Witwer did a pretty tremendous job with a relatively smaller role in BSG, and I was really excited to see him in the game Star Wars: The Force Unleashed and Smallville after that.
"Did you wanna be the Final fifth? I actually did not. I felt that bringing Crashdown back would have cheapened his story and his mark on the series. Here was a guy who demonstrated how difficult these situations truly were. Most of the time you see Lee or Kara handle something. It looks tough, but our steely eyed regulars win the day. It was interesting to me to see the opposite. To tell the story of what happens when you have a good, competent man running the show, but unfortunately he's good and competent at being a Raptor pilot, not a man in command of infantry. I thought that was interesting and it was my intention to make that as real and reasonable as possible.Making him a cylon would have gutted or at the very least invalidated a very important part of that story."
While the big shebang is coming on July 28, where you can purchase The Complete Series collection of BSG on both Blu-ray and standard DVD and season 4.5 on it's own (on both standard DVD and Blu-ray) - if you were looking to just buy one or two individual seasons of BSG on Blu-ray, or perhaps chip away at purchasing the entire series on Blu-ray rather than all in one collection at once, you can on August 4.
Right now it looks like the individual Blu-ray seasons will simply be 1, 2, 3 and 4, which presumably means that season 2.5 will be included in 2, and 4.5 will be included in 4. That's not confirmed yet, but it seems the reasonable assumption to make given the massive amount of space available on a Blu-ray disc as compared to standard DVD. We can also probably safely assume that all available bonus content will be included as well. Also in question is whether Razor will appear on Blu-ray with any of the seasons (season 4?), or separately. Razor, along with the Miniseries both have a link on Amazon for a Blu-ray version, but with no release date (which really doesn't mean much in Amazonia-land). Also, what about The Plan? The original series?? More details on the content when it's available! via The HD Room
Edit - The Amazon preorder links at The HD Room are no longer active, at least when I checked. Hmmm.
Maureen Ryan of The Chicago Tribune's "The Watcher" blog reports that SciFi prez David Howe says The Plan is slated to debut in November, and Caprica is "likely" to debut in January. Hmmm, don't love the use of the word "likely", which could easily mean "probably April".
Crave Online caught a few words from Tricia Helfer who was present for the Caprica screening at Paleyfest this April. Tricia was finally able to give some thoughts on the BSG finale, but what I found intriguing were her comments about the new Caprica series:
"Crave Online: How much would you like to appear on Caprica in any form?
Tricia Helfer: You know, I know nothing about the storyline of Caprica really. I’ve heard little snippets here and there from Ron and so forth but I’m super excited to see it today. This is going to be the first time I’ve seen anything from it, so I’d certainly show up if my character was called upon."
It doesn't seem likely that the character of Caprica Six would appear within the Caprica series timeline, but the notion revived one of those lingering BSG questions for me - How were the likenesses of the different models of Cylon skin-jobs created? Were they modeled after real human individuals, or were they the product of some sort of customization formula? If the former were the case, then perhaps the human predecessor of Six can exist in the timeline of the Caprica prequel. Neato!
But wait, she and Gauis are also some sort of spirit guide, so really they could be anywhere, and everywhere, at any time and in anybody's head - right?
Bonus - Here's a recent 2 part video interview with Tricia by cinetvbuzz.com (I don't recommend clicking that link since it opened up a barrage of pop-up ads for me) during the Festival TV Monte Carlo earlier this month. Mild spoilers for The Plan!:
VFX artist Darth Mojo posted an excellent behind-the-scenes look at the creation of the ancient Cylons that were excavated on "Earth I". FX supervisor Gary Hutzel worked with chief model maker and Cylon builder Pierre Drolet looked back to Samurai battle gear to fashion the ancient Cylons, but found it slightly too similar to the iconic Darth Vader, so they trimmed it back a bit:
New images of the Blu-ray release of The Complete Series have made it to the web, and it appears the box set looks similar yet has additional images at the bottom of the box, and... an apostrophe where there shouldn't be one in "One of the best drama's on TV". Hee hee. I hope that's just in the promotional images and they catch it before they mass produce too many more of the whopping $300+ Blu-ray set (actual retail will be in the mid $200s, and hopefully will get price cuts later on).
Of all the televisions owned by drama, it really is the best! ;)
Battlestar Galactica: The Complete Series will be released on DVD and Blu-ray on July 28, along with the stand-alone version of season 4.5. Bear McCreary's season 4 soundtrack is due to release a little before then on July 21!
SciFi.com just put up a sneak peek for the upcoming (the rumors now say September) BSG movie The Plan. Check it out below, and below that check out the original teaser. I'm hoping those outside the US can see this!
Better late than never! Late spring has been a very busy time, and whenever I go to make a Dispatch update I get more and more overwhelmed. But we will put it off no longer and start to chip away at all the juicy BSG tidbits. Lots o' BSG events recently...
The LA Times Hero Complex blog brings us good chunk of video coverage from the Battlestar Panel at Hollywood & Highland that took place on June 4, which was a sort of follow-up from the BSG UN Panel earlier this spring. There is some talk of The Plan, so if you want to be completely spoiler-free watch out! Apparently attendees screened a new trailer for The Plan, but it's not out for public view just yet. We'll be keeping an eye out for other sources that attended the event.
Did someone mention robots? The Carnegie Science Center in Pittsburgh has just opened the Roboworld exhibit, which features many of our favorite famous bots in the Robot Hall of Fame. I've been looking into what Cylon presence there may be there, and I'm hoping that either or both Caprica Six and Scar get inducted!! I just wrote in a nomination for Caprica Six, and if it gets accepted it will be listed here, so check back at some point and see if she shows up, and vote! I may also try to nominate Scar (since he's the only real character representation of either the centurions or the raiders), but I don't know if he's quite famous enough. Hopefully Six doesn't have too much skin to be in the Robot Hall of Fame!
The picture of Six to the right is the June picture for the Battlestar Galactica 2009 calendar hanging above my desk :)
Bear McCreary kicks off his summer season tours today with a performance in downtown Los Angeles as part of their Grand Performance Series (which is also kicking off the season with Bear!). The event is free and outdoors, so if you're in the area you MUST go, and take lots of pictures for us more distant fans! Bear will also be performing at San Diego's House of Blues and all three nights at SDCC, which will at the same time be the launch for the season 4 soundtrack! Yeay! Check out Bear's blog for all the dates.
Also, check out this Sci Fi video clip of Bear and the orchestra recording tracks for season 4.5! (Hulu version below) You may note that the beginning of the video mentions that more behind-the-scenes stuff will be available on the complete series DVD set, which is scheduled to be released on July 28 along with season 4.5 on it's own. I have to wonder if there will be different bonus content in the complete series DVD release than what we have been getting in each season DVD set - ?
Canada East's Times & Transcript reports on Ron Moore's appearance at the Banff World Television Festival. Moore says that webisodes are probably a passing fad and mentions the shooting schedule and progress for Caprica.
Speaking of RDM, not only is he hard at work with Caprica, but Virtuality has also been making a buzz in the news and it's looking more like it will become an actual series, as /Film reports. Wired.com's Underwire blog recently posted a feature about Virtuality also (and don't forget to check out the "see also" links at the bottom of the story!). io9 also has some more details about Virtuality.
Virtuality has also been bumped up to air on June 26th, rather than the dreaded July 4th event it was scheduled for (dreaded because most people would be out watching fireworks instead of watching it!) - via SF Universe
- Remember, for all the links that discuss unaired shows or movies it should be assumed that they will contain spoilers!
If you haven't heard the big news already, Katee Sackhoff has been signed on for season 8 of 24. She will be playing CTU data analyst Dana Walsh. Dang. I had given up on 24 way back in season 2 because I missed a whole bunch of episodes. By the time season 5 or 6 rolled around, it seemed hopeless to catch up. I'd like to ask any 24 fans if I really have to watch everything, or can I just jump back in to season 8 and figure it out from there? Starlog
Ooh ooh ooh! Action Figure Insider has gained confirmation that the Battlestar Minimates line will be revived as a Toys R Us exclusive!
Battlestar has been nominated for Program of the Year form the Television Critics Association. It's main contender for the award is probably going to be Lost, but lets hope they give the win to BSG since it won't be able to receive this particular award again! Airlock Alpha
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