As nerds, we connect to fictional personalities in a way “normal” people often look at as oddly serious, if not downright creepy. I’m not saying we don’t understand the difference between fantasy and reality – I’m merely pointing out that many of us are creative, sensitive people. Well-crafted imaginary characters often resonate deeply with us, and their losses can be quite harrowing. While I’m sure there are a few folks out there who’d love to re-enact key scenes from Misery with, let’s say, Joss Whedon (I’m half convinced he’s only bringing back Agent Coulson for S.H.I.E.L.D so he can slaughter him in an even more traumatizing manner), most of us stick to bitching and moaning on the Internet, threatening to boycott the shows in question, and then coming back for more next week.
But however much outrage and despair they may inspire, character deaths are often some of the most memorable moments on television – and feature some of the best writing and performances as well. Sure, there’s no shortage of poorly thought out, bullshit deaths, but they’re for another list. Get out your hankies, my nerdy brethren and sistren, and prepare to have your hearts kicked in the balls all over again with The Top 10 Saddest, Most Gut Wrenching Deaths in Nerdy Television.
NOTE: As most of you will have assumed simply from the nature of this list, it features spoilers galore. If you haven’t seen one of the shows featured, and wish to feel the full emotional impact of seeing one of its characters snuff it, I advise you to skip the entry in question. Enjoy!
The CW announced the early renewals for three of its most popular, and profitable shows, Arrow, The Vampire Diaries, and Supernatural. Arrow for its second season, the fifth season for The Vampire Diaries and an incredible 9th season for Supernatural. The renewal for Supernatural was a lock considering stars Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles both signed fantastic multi-season deals last year.
Mark Pedowitz, the President of CW Networks took to the CW Blog to make the announcement:
We said last year that one of our goals was to establish building blocks to grow on, and now with our new hit ‘Arrow’ and fan favorite ‘Supernatural’ on Wednesday night, and the continued success of ‘The Vampire Diaries’ on Thursday, we’ve been able to do that. Not only do ‘Arrow’, ‘Supernatural’, and ‘The Vampire Diaries’ perform well on-air, they’re also extremely successful for us both digitally and socially. I’m thrilled to have all three shows returning to our schedule next season.
Here’s some of the CW bragging points Pedowitz talked about for each show:
Arrow:
Most watched CW show at an average 4.3 million viewers.
Best CW series premiere since 2009.
The Vampire Diaries:
CW’s highest rated series in the adults and women 18-34 age group.
Trendrr’s number one “Social Program” for Network TV during weeks January 21st and 27th.
Supernatural:
Going into its ninth season the show has seen a dramatic upswing in viewers after pairing with Arrow. 15% among total viewers and 10% in adults 18-34 and 18% in adults 18-49.
Early renewals are only given to series whose pickup for additional seasons are never in doubt. CW still has a number of series straddling the renewal fence, 90210, Nikita, Hart Of Dixie and new series Beauty And The Beast as well as The Carrie Diaries, none of which have made any real impression on viewers of in the weekly ratings.
Of the three I only really watch Arrow, although I have been told repeatedly by others that both Supernatural and The Vampire Dairies are worth a look. Which of these three are on your DVR list?
I can’t wait for the day when I’ll finally get my hands on one of these for myself! As many of us nerds know, going to the San Diego Comic-Conmeans coming back with some damn awesome bags.
Warner Bros has released their TV series designs for this year, and they include bags for The Big Bang Theory, Arrow, DC Nation, Fringe, The Vampire Diaries and Supernatural.
The designs for the movie bags haven’t been released yet, but we can expect to see Man of Steel and Pacific Rim on bags. (more…)
It may have been a bit anticlimactic considering that The CW announced that Being Human showrunner Jeremy Carver would be replace Sera Gamble at the head of Supernatural‘s writers room last month, but the netlet made it official today when Supernatural was announced as one of three shows it was renewing for the 2012-13 season.
Supernatural, which stars Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles as the demon-hunting Winchester Brothers, premiered on the now defunct WB in 2005. This renewal guarantees, at least, an eighth season for the show. Anything after that will depend on ratings, and if Padalecki and Ackles can be persuaded to stick around, they’re own contracts run out at the end of next season.
Now I’m afraid I don’t watch Supernatural, so I can’t speak intelligently about the show. I do know that it was a pretty substantial and vocal fan base, so this is excellent news for them, unless they’re of the opinion that the show should have ended two seasons ago and that season 7 Supernatural isn’t as good as season 3 Supernatural.
And for the record, the other two shows renewed by The CW are 90210 and The Vampire Diaries.
Geek worlds collide in an upcoming episode when someone from the Whedonverse gets mixed up with the Winchester brothers. Executive producer Sera Gamble told TVGuide.com that Felicia Day will guest-star on the April 27 episode titled “The Girl With the Dungeons and Dragons Tattoo.”
“We were so stoked that she agreed to do the episode because we’re all fan girls and boys here,” Gamble says.
The title is a reference to the bestselling Steig Larsson crime novel The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and the acclaimed big-screen adaptation of the same name. Like Larsson’s protagonist, Day will portray a young woman who’s handy with a computer.
Everyone knows that Day has serious geek cred. She’s a true gamer, creator, writer, and star in the original web series The Guild, as well as appearing in numerous Joss Whedon projects such as Buffy, the Vampire Slayer, Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog and Dollhouse.
“Felicia plays a girl named Charlie who is sort of a lowly tech working in one of Dick Roman’s companies,” says Gamble. “She’s an amateur computer hacker and unwittingly gets wrapped up in Sam and Dean’s problems. It’s a classic story of an everyday girl who does not want to be in a whistleblower position.”
It’s Ghosts on a Plane! From the director of The Grudge (the original Japanese Grudge not the American remake)! Comes the upcoming supernatural thriller, 7500.
The film is about a group of flight attendants and passengers on Flight 7500 from Los Angeles to Tokyo trying to cope with some supernatural craziness in flight. The trailer has just been released, and if I have the story right, it seems the craziness starts when some douche refuses to turn off his cellphone before take-off… and it’s not Alec Baldwin! Kidding. Let’s roll the clip:
7500, directed by Takashi Shimizu and starring Leslie Bibb, Ryan Kwanten, Amy Smart, Jamie Chung, Christian Serratos, Scout Taylor-Compton and Johnathan Schaech, will be released on August 31.
Do you like researching the occult? Do you enjoy monster slaying and saving humanity from dangerous creatures? Are you between the ages of 9 and 10 and live in the Portland, Oregon area? Then B.P.R.D Training Camp might be the keep busy activity for you this summer!
This new camp, which is based on the fictional organization The Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense from the Hellboy comics published by Dark Horse, will open this July with a five-day program that promises to give kids a unique outdoors experience that combines normal camping activities with supernatural crime-solving. Here’s what kids can expect from the camp courtesy of their official website:
“Find out if you have what it takes to join an elite team of paranormal investigators combating the forces of darkness from all across the globe. We immerse you in tactical training of all forms, including survival skills in any environment (both earthly and non), martial arts and self-defense specific to praeternatural entities, hand to hand weaponry (we train foam swords, bows and more) and forensic investigation. All these key skills that every agent must have, plus you are steeped in the history of our Bureau and legacy of paranormal research.”
Older than 10? Not to worry, the camp has a more intensive program for young people between the ages of 11 and 17:
“Older recruits also investigate nearby ‘haunts’, then finally travel to Camp Trackers near Sandy, Oregon to investigate reports of dark figures and strange happenings at the remnants of the old defunct town of Marmot. Here they search for legendary and lost pioneer cemetery (true story) to ask local spectres and spirits about the town’s history and the legend of Adolph Aschoff, the man who is said to have sealed away an ancient evil upon the founding of the town.”
The last time Arnold Schwarzenegger was involved in anything supernatural -besides being the governor of his own state- it was 1999′s End of Days. And wouldn’t you know it, thirteen years later the Terminator is set to star in another end of the world type movie. Infidelity be damned!
Where the the Mayans right all along, is “Ah-nuld” going be the end of the world? Maybe.
Schwarzenegger told followers at TheArnoldFans that in his next project he’ll be “kind of an angel”.
Titled Black Sunday, the site described the movie as a cross between Commando and Constantine, with Schwarzenegger “raging [sic] war against weapons dealers as an immortal instrument of death.”
Black Sunday was originally called Black Sands, with the script said to be a mixture of action thrillers like the Denzel Washington‘sMan on Fire and the Clint Eastwood western High Plains Drifter. At some point the supernatural element got thrown in there.
Black Sunday is set to start production in New Mexico on April 1st, with a possible release set sometime in 2013. That is, if we’re still around after 2012.
Talk about your television production super-teams! Jon Favreau (Iron Man and Cowboys & Aliens), Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci (co-creators of Fringe, Star Trek screenwriters), Seth Green (co-creator of Robot Chicken) and Michael Dougherty (co-writer of X2, writer/director of Trick ‘R Treat) are teaming up to produce a new series called Ex-Comm, which sounds like an unusual blend of The X-Files and The West Wing with a dash of Eureka.In other words, they’re aiming for a supernatural drama with a sense of humor.
Ex-Comm will focus on a newly elected President of the United States and his or her executive committee (or ex-comm) as they tackle supernatural threats and conspiracy theories affecting the U.S. Obviously there’s no word yet on casting, script details, or a shooting schedule, not to mention where we might eventually see this probable geek masterpiece, but all five names above are signed on as writers and executive producers, while Favreau will direct the pilot.
So any takers for who might play the President? Maybe David Duchovny, with Gillian Anderson playing the First Lady who also has mysterious psychic powers. Better still, maybe a West Wing reunion where Rob Lowe plays the National Security. who’s a veteran of CIA experiments in remote viewing. and Bradley Whitford as the Secretary of Defense who was abducted by aliens. One more question: Is Brad Meltzer involved in this in any way yet, and if not why hasn’t he heard of it yet?
Remember The X-Files? The cult TV phenomenon that became a major hit for the then still youthful Fox Network? So much so that it was turned into a major motion picture and a summer tentpole for 20th Century Fox in the summer of 1998, even though the show itself was still on the air? Following the supernatural adventures of the intrepid FBI Agents Mulder and Scully, the series started to flounder when the complex alien invasion mythology became definitively confusing, and then star David Duchovny thought he was getting too big for the show and quit, leaving on screen partner Gillain Anderson to carry the torch alone with the T-1000 and the chick from Mystic Pizza who’s not Julia Roberts.
Well, Anderson is stirring the pot about revisiting The X-Files again on a recently taped segment for the Australian morning show Sunrise. While doing an interview with host Kylie Speer about her role in the new sequel to the spy-spoof Johnny English, Anderson confirmed that a third X-Files is in the planning stages and will perhaps be on screens everywhere as early as next year. Speer later shared the revelation on her Twitter account, the interview itself will air sometime in the near future.
Surprising news? Yeah, a little. The first X-Files movie did an okay $84 million in business, and that was at the height of the show’s popularity. The sequel released in 2008 made just over $20 million at the box office, and this despite an over six year respite for the franchise after the series ended in 2002. While the teenage me that grew up watching The X-Files in the 90s would love to see another kick at the can, I was really underwhelmed by the 2008 sequel. Unless Chris Carter has a real once in a lifetime idea for an X-Files movie, maybe it’s time to leave well enough alone. Or reboot it. Ha!
I can’t wait for the day when I’ll finally get my hands on one of these for myself! As many of us nerds know, going to the San Diego Comic-Conmeans coming back with some damn awesome bags.
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