It lost its edge years and years and years ago, but The Simpsons is still worth watching occasionally, particularly for the guest voices. Fox has announced that guest stars for next season will include Kiefer Sutherland, Natalie Portman, Michael Imperioli, Joe Pantoliano, The White Stripes and Dr Phil. Can’t wait for the Kiefer appearance, myself…
But here’s the weirder bit: they’re also getting on authors Tom Wolfe, Gore Vidal, Michael Chabon and Jonathan Franzen. That’s just odd.
Everyone’s favourite insect fan, Gil Grissom from CSI, is going to take a leave of absence for a couple of episodes this season after reaching some kind of “emotional high”. Turns out William Petersen is off to do some theatre for a bit, which is something he’s been threatening to do for some time, so the producers are going to write around his absence.
It’s been promised that a ‘big name’ is going to fill the gap left by Petersen, which is an interesting fact indeed. Consider that this coming season is going to be the seventh for CSI, which is the traditional end point for most shows after which all contracts have to be renegotiated. Petersen has been extremely vocal about his desire to head back to the theatre just as soon as contract expires.
However, CSI is still such a ratings champion, it seems unlikely that CBS will simply end the show. That means they’ll either need a new Grissom or will promote from within, given they have such a large cast. Will this ‘big name’ be a test run for Grissom’s season eight replacement?
Bill Lawrence, creator of Scrubs, is writing and directing a prequel to Chevy Chase’s Fletch series of movies (which were based on a series of books). And he’d like Zach Braff as the lead…
The Hollywood Reporter has details of a new regular appearing on Lost next season. To avoid, spoiling you, I’ll leave all the facts to the Reporter, rather than splurge them here.
There are also some big spoilers over on SciFi Wire, if you’re interested.
Remember Aquaman? No? Not surprising really. Almost no one’s seen it until today, because it was a failed pilot for new network The CW. But in a move that echoes Nobody’s Watching‘s emergence on YouTube, NBC is selling it on iTunes in the US.
Could this be the way of the future? Networks making money from pilots they never even turned into series?
I hope not. When you consider some of the shows that do become series, you have to wonder how bad some of those failed pilots have to be to avoid being turned into series. And then be asked to pay to for them? No thank you.
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