BFI events

The last week’s news in review.

Doctor Who

• First, The Sun claimed that David Tennant was going to quit Doctor Who during series four, suggesting Robert Carlyle as his replacement. Then the Beeb issued a ‘denial’ that said the rumour wasn’t true, that DT is completely committed to series three but that since series four hasn’t even been commissioned and negotiations haven’t started yet, they couldn’t comment on it yet. Then Robert Carlyle and the Beeb ‘confirmed’ to Functionpix that in fact he would be taking over from DT in the fourth series. Then DT’s dad said DT was too busy filming series three to even think about series four. Then DT told Top of the Pops magazine, “As long as I don’t get the sack, I’ll do another series.” So make of all that what you will.
• The Runaway Bride got an audience appreciation of 84 and 8.7 million viewers.
• The Doctor is going to be “out of his depth” when he faces the Daleks again next series.
• Lis Sladen would like to wear black leather in The Sarah Jane Adventures.

Film

• There’s a teaser trailer for the sequel to Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. It looks surprisingly good.
• Filming on Indiana Jones IV will finally begin this year, for release in May 2008.
• Daniel Craig looks like he’s going to undo his Casino Royale good work by appearing in a rubbish-sounding sci-fi movie with Nicole Kidman.

British TV

• There’s a Green Wing special event at the NFT on the 17th January. There will be an on-stage interview with creator Victoria Pile and “(we hope) cast members Tamsin Greig, Stephen Mangan and Julian Rhind-Tutt”.

US TV

• Songs from the forthcoming musical episode of Scrubs are up on YouTube: Everything Comes Down to Poo and Guy Love.
• ABC has commissioned a pilot based on the movie Mr and Mrs Smith. Events pick up six months later in a new house that has a magic reset button inside it.
• Comedy writers hate Studio 60.
• At least one dead character in Lost is to return in a flashback (spoiler).
• Meanwhile, Lost producer Damon Lindelof gives some explanations about the show’s direction that are sure to annoy a whole load of people.
• Heroes boss Tim Kring gives stonking loads of spoilers about what happens in the rest of the season. And so does Bryan Fuller.
• A direct-to-video Battlestar Galactica TV movie is being worked on.
• There’s a lot of guff around about Sci-Fi’s new series The Dresden Files, which stars Paul Blackthorne (the English baddie in season three of 24) as a wizard-for-hire in modern day Chicago.
• Pics of Christopher Eccleston in Heroes are now available, thanks to a trailer on NBC.
• More news on what happened to the remaining episodes of all those shows cancelled this season.