Mark's Sci-Fi / Fantasy Blog

In the final moments of Eureka's fourth episode this season, "I Do Over," Nathan Stark (Ed Quinn) seems to vanish into time, and the characters think he's dead. Fans reeled: Why kill off Nathan, a character that has grown in interesting ways since his introduction early in season 1, and who worked so effectively as a counterpoint to Jack Carter (Colin Ferguson) and Henry (Joe Morton)?

Is he dead? Does this leave the way clear for Carter and Allison (Salli Richardson) to get together? Is this a good thing for the show? Is it another case of killing off the third wheel, a phenomenon I discussed earlier in the year?

Check out the preliminary thinking here.

Young wizard Harry Potter is the latest victim of last winter's writers' strike: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, originally slated for Thanksgiving release, has been pushed back to next July to fill the void in the Warner Brothers' summer blockbuster schedule left by a hundred days without writers.

The irony is that the special effects-heavy film was apparently on schedule for its Nov. 21 release – in fact production is reportedly already complete. It's being moved to July 17 not because director David Yates needs more time to finish the movie, but because the studio needs a summer cash machine and expects the climactic Half-Blood Prince, the sixth film in the Harry Potter series, to deliver in spades.

"We are still feeling the repercussions of the writers strike, which impacted the readiness of scripts for other films – changing the competitive landscape for 2009 and offering new windows of opportunity that we wanted to take advantage of," said Warners president Alan Horn. "We agreed the best strategy was to move Half-Blood Prince to July, where it perfectly fills the gap for a major tentpole release for midsummer."

In other words, Half-Blood Prince is going to sit in a can for eight months just so that Warners won't have a weak summer. This despite the fact that its screenwriter, Steve Kloves, fretted to Entertainment Weekly that the Potter movies might start to tank without regular book releases to support them.
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The spate of Star Wars parodies that started turning up last year wasn't just about the original film turning 30. After all, stuff turns 30 all the time. Operation Petticoat turned 30 last year as well, but you don't see very many splashy claymation specials featuring the likenesses of John Astin and Jamie Lee Curtis. Which is a shame, really.

Star Wars, more than any other science fiction phenomenon, inspires a creative desire in those who love it most, which is why parodies like Star Wars: Robot Chicken and Family Guy: Blue Harvest, both now out on DVD, wear their devotion on their sleeves even as they send up the best and worst bits of the six-film franchise.

And the Star Wars franchise is, despite George Lucas's best (or worst) efforts, very much alive (there's a new movie out now, in case you haven't heard, setting up a CGI series coming in the fall), which means amateur Star Wars satire-tributes are still cropping up. YouTube is already littered with folks cutting their desktop special-effects teeth on videos in which AfterEffects clones try to kill each other with light sabers and finger-lightning, and the video snarks have jumped on the Star Wars bandwagon, creating clips that range from awful to hilarious to gasp-inducing (perennial parodists the Fine Brothers have discovered a use for a light saber so very, very wrong I can't even link to it).

The best of the lot is still Robot Chicken: Star Wars, if only because its rapid-fire blackouts are a perfect way to jar you into looking at Boba Fett, Emperor Palpatine, and all those minor characters only the true geeks know the names of, in a whole new way. And there's more geek-fest comedy to come: Cartoon Network has announced a sequel to the Robot Chicken special is in the works, slated to premiere Nov. 16. That's news good enough to make even Ponda Baba smile.

• Review: Robot Chicken: Star Wars
• Image gallery
• Watch trailer
• Compare prices on the DVD
• More about Robot Chicken

When Torchwood returns for a brief, five-episode third season in 2009, it's also set to air on BBC America, where Torchwood has gained the highest ratings in the cable network's history.

"We've decided to do a five-part mini-series, one big story that will run during one week," Torchwood executive producer Julie Gardner told TV Guide in June. "I wanted to make a really big noise about the show."

At Comic-Con in San Diego, it was officially announced that Torchwood season 3 will air on BBC America shortly after originally airing on BBC1 in the U.K. The five-episode mini-series may air in Britain as a week-long event, but BBC America is less likely to do so here. The first two seasons were both 13 episodes.

The only casting we can be sure of is John Barrowman (Captain Jack Harkness) and Eve Myles (Gwen Cooper). Gareth David-Lloyd (Ianto Jones), featured alongside Myles in the Doctor Who finale two-parter "The Stolen Earth"/"Journey's End", is to return, but may be marginalized if the show is streamlined and, if rumor holds true, the show's racier content is reduced in deference to younger fans.

The denouement of "Journey's End," which saw Jack walking off with Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman) seemingly trying to woo her away from UNIT, with Mickey Smith (Noel Clarke) catching up to both of them after having expressed a need to carve out a new future for himself, was also very suggestive to those wondering about who would be in Torchwood's third season. Some rumors have stated that Agyeman will definitely be a regular for season 3, and I think it's likely to turn out to be true. (Rumors also suggest Barrowman will be reducing his involvement, with the show's focus presumably shifting to Gwen and Martha.)

(Update: as noted by a commenter below, The Sun has reported that the BBC dropped Agyeman from Torchwood season 3 after she signed on to do the ITV version of Law & Order. As The Sun's record of accuracy regarding dramatic TV show casting is quite spotty, we'll need more info, especially as no announcements regarding casting have been made for the ITV show; but word is spreading that both Agyeman and Battlestar Galactica's Jamie Bamber will be in Law & Order: London.)
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Season 3 of one of my favorite shows, Eureka, has debuted with a few changes, and I'm still at the stage where I'm not sure that they amount to advancing the show or tampering with it.

The first big change is the introduction of Eva Thorne (Frances Fisher), an all-purpose nemesis who takes over Global Dynamics (and so effectively the town) with a mandate to make the enterprise more profitable and business-efficient; her reputation has been one of bloodletting and ruthless realignment at Fortune 100 companies, and the Department of Defense, apparently seeing no difference between a genius factory and General Motors, has engaged her to do the same in Eureka.

From the show's structural standpoint, this means that a superfluity of Global Dynamics heads: the first season chief, Nathan Stark (Ed Quinn), and the season 2 head, Allison Blake (Salli Richardson), are both still on scene reporting to new boss Thorne. But the real problem is that Thorne is starting out solely as a device designed to create conflict within the cast – it all seems so artificial, especially the way she is choosing the favor some and glare at others.

Hints shown already make it clear that more is planned for Thorne, as she digs deeper into what's going on in Eureka, and before long she'll find a project to give her some continuity and purpose other than arbitrarily screwing around with what the other characters want. I'll reserve judgment for now, but I'm a little concerned that the introduction of such a character as a device signals a loss of subtlety for this very intelligent and wryly written show.
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Tired of superheroes? There's nary a one on the docket for August, though there are plenty of red-blooded, two-fisted "hero" heroes, from Rick O'Connell to Obi-Wan Kenobi.

This month's releases include the third Mummy film, the Star Wars animated feature, the Death Race remake with Jason Statham, and a Vin Diesel apocalyptic thriller. And you thought there'd be nothing left to watch after you saw Dark Knight ten or twelve times!

• Future Films: August 2008
• Video, trailers, and clips for The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor
• Video, trailers, and clips for Star Wars: The Clone Wars
• Video, trailers, and clips for Death Race
• Video, trailers, and clips for Babylon A.D.

Some time ago I introduced a feature called Slightly Obscure Cinema, a venue for me to write about sci-fi films that aren't household names. These are films that aimed a bit lower than the multiplex-filling summer blockbusters, and so often have that certain appeal of the overlooked. The inaugural film was the decidedly overlooked time-twister 12:01, which had its merits despite starring Jonathan Silverman.

This time I review Happy Accidents, which features codependent Marisa Tomei and goofy suitor Vincent D'Onofrio, a regular guy with a barcode on his arm who claims to be from the future. This charming indie romantic comedy with a touch of sci-fi (usually it's the other way around) also stars Holland Taylor and has a cute cameo from a pre-Dead Zone Anthony Michael Hall.

• Read review
• Image gallery
• Watch trailer
• Compare prices: Happy Accidents on DVD

It may seem like Stargate Continuum exists just for the casting, since everyone from Jack O'Neill to Apophis makes a return in this, the second direct-to-DVD film based on the ten-season series Stargate SG-1. (Stargate Ark of Truth came out earlier this year.)

But Stargate Continuum is in fact a solid time-travel adventure story, and it's worth seeing just for the sci-fi twists that come from a time-travel plot and the deluxe production values lavished on this $7 million production. Stargate Continuum is available July 29 on DVD and Blu-Ray.

• Stargate Continuum Review
• Stargate Continuum Image Gallery
• Compare prices on the Stargate Continuum DVD
• Interview: Beau Bridges

Season 3 of Eureka premieres Tuesday night at 9 p.m. with the promise of a much lighter set of storylines than last year's increasingly dark surprises.

Ed Quinn told me at the Sci Fi up fronts that there was a deliberate effort made to make season 3 brighter and more colorful after all the angst and confrontation last year. But the big change we do know about promises confrontation aplenty: Frances Fisher (Glory Days) has joined the cast as Eva Thorne, otherwise known as "The Fixer." Called in to "fix" Eureka after the metal-eating bacteria caused extensive damage at the end of last season, Thorne has been given complete control and has a reputation for getting her way no matter what.

Zane (Niall Matter), the cocky, high-tech criminal who's also the town's latest and most promising genius – not to mention a love interest for Jo (Erica Cerra) – is going to get some continuing exposure after his splashy arrival late in season 2. And his cameo appearance in the promo video (see below) suggests a continuing presence for Zoe's new boyfriend, the quiet, curly-haired Lucas (Vanya Asher), also added toward the end of last season.

Here's more on Eureka:

• About 'Eureka': Essential Information
• 'Eureka' Image Gallery
• 'Eureka' Cast and Characters
• 'Eureka' DVD releases
• 'Eureka' Episode Guide

Sci Fi is airing a marathon of all thirteen episodes of season 2 all day Tuesday, leading straight into the season 3 premiere at 9 p.m.

The new season is being promoted by a very cute video in which Colin Ferguson and cast sing (more or less) a version of the Mr. Rogers theme, "Won't You Be My Neighbor" in a big production number. And the fact that Colin Ferguson can't sing just makes him all the more endearing, doesn't it?

In the past, I've complained about sci-fi seems to be restricted to the ghetto of visual effects when Emmy nominations come around. But this year, sci-fi and fantasy shows are literally all over the Emmy awards, from acting and writing to sound and editing to, yes, special effects.

The darling this year is Pushing Daisies, with tons of nominations including lead actor (Lee Pace) and supporting actress (Kristin Chenoweth), as well as writing and a slew of creative and technical nods.

• A complete list of the Emmy Award nominations for 2007-2008 is here, with sci-fi/fantasy nominees highlighted.
• A discussion of the nominations in sci-fi / fantasy, as well as detailed breakdown of the 49 sci-fi / fantasy nominations, is here.