News

Every week day, I let you know what’s happening in the world of television from around the world

Lost moments are losing it

4 December 2006 Rob Buckley Post a comment

This year, US networks have had a change of policy about how they air their big shows. Rather than do what they’ve always done and air a few new episodes, then some repeats, then some more new episodes, then some repeats, ad infinitum, they’ve gone for two blocks of episodes: one before Christmas, one after Christmas, with a stonking great big gap in between.

In part, they can do this because of the Internet. Even with a two-month wait, shows like Jericho are pumping out extra content on their web sites to keep people interested. Lost is also doing this with “Lost moments”, clips from the next season that are designed to whet the appetite of viewers.

The trouble is, they’re not very good and lots of fans are p’ed off. After all, two and a bit seasons in and the distinct feeling is that

  1. Lost‘s producers are making it up as they go along
  2. That’s two and a bit years invested in something whose denouement in another two and a half years’ time isn’t going to be very interesting
  3. We’re never going to find out what half the good stuff means.

Valid concerns or not, the Lost moments don’t seem to be helping things. Judge for yourself why this might be after the jump. Note, if you’ve not seen any of season three yet, there are some slight spoilers in terms of who’s survived the finale of season two; if you have seen season three or are currently watching it on Sky One, there are no real spoilers, which is partly why the fans are annoyed. For my part, I will say the moments are clearly leading somewhere, although as with all things Lost-ian, I suspect we’ll have to wait till the last one to find out if it was worth it.

Continue reading “Lost moments are losing it”

Weekend news

4 December 2006 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

A few of the stories that broke over the weekend:

More Preacher details

1 December 2006 Rob Buckley 5 Comments

More news on HBO’s Preacher. Amongst other things of note, the new Preacher series is going to recreate the individual issues of the Preacher comic as faithfully as possible. The writer, Mark Steven Johnson, also comments on the now-cancelled movie:

“Well, Preacher is 70-something issues,” he said. “There was going to be a movie made of Preacher a while ago, and I read the script, and it broke my heart. Because I’m like, ‘Oh, it’s not a two-hour movie. Preacher’s six years—six dedicated years of the most incredible stuff you’ve ever seen in your whole life. So I always thought HBO was the only way to do that.”

Big Finish news

1 December 2006 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Freshly plucked news about the audio plays from a nice man who went to a US convention where Big Finish head honcho Jason Haigh-Ellery was in residence.

  • Their Doctor Who licence has just been extended again. It will now run until December 2009. (And apparently, the request for an extension was the first thing on Gary Russell’s desk on his first day on the job in Cardiff on the new series.)
  • We have not heard the last of the newer companions created in the Big Finish range like Charley, Hex, Erimem and so on, but there will be fewer stories with them after the relaunch as more emphasis is placed on the TV companions, and they’re also considering creating some more new companions.
  • The BBC7 series will run on Sunday nights beginning on New Year’s Eve. Exact time slot is yet to be determined. It will have the David Arnold theme music, but it’s been remixed a bit, and also, episode three, Horror of Glam Rock, will feature its own “glam rock” version.
  • While the BBC7 McGann CDs are coming out, there will not be any other McGann stories coming out in the CD range… it’ll be 5-6-7 until the radio season is finished coming out.
  • Matthew Sweet is writing a Doctor Who audio that’s a silent movie. Yes, you read that right.
  • Sylvester McCoy said over the weekend that he’d quite like to be a baddie in something for Big Finish, and Jason liked the sound of that a lot.
  • Sales have recovered quite a bit since the big hit they took after the relaunch of the TV series in 2005.
  • Jason was “95% sure” that Renaissance of the Daleks with Peter Davison will co-star Sarah Sutton as Nyssa. It hasn’t been recorded yet though. She has told them that she’d like to do more audios again than the one-a-year she had cut it back to.
  • There’s nothing more for Turlough in the pipeline at the moment simply because of Mark Strickson’s schedule, but they will always record more with him when he’s in the UK and available.
  • Unless sales pick up there will probably not be a third series of Sapphire and Steel audios. All weekend long Nigel Fairs kept forcing the phrase “Sapphire and Steel starring David Warner and Susannah Harker” into the panel discussions, to increasingly funny effect. By Sunday the audience were saying it along with him. For the same reason, there will probably not be anymore Doctor Who audio script books or music CDs.