Canadian TV

Review: 19-2 (Bravo)

3 February 2014 Rob Buckley 16 Comments

19-2

In Canada: Wednesdays, 9e/6p, Bravo

Canada is, of course, a country of two languages: English and French. Now, while English-language TV in Canada underwent something of a renaissance in recent years, quickly followed by a dip as a cut in government funding for the CBC killed off a number of more expensive shows, French-Canadian shows continued to do well. In fact, they’ve been proving a valuable source of material for the English-language networks, which have been adapting some of the more popular shows: Sophie and Rumours have already hit the airwaves, Unité 9 is on the way on CBC, and now we have 19-2, based on the original 19-2. Easy to translate that one.

It’s certainly a good choice for a remake, easily one of the best cop dramas English-language Canada has produced, recently – although that’s not hard, admittedly, given competition such as Motive and Cracked. In a lot of ways, it’s Canada’s answer to Southland, with 19-2 the call sign of the cop car driven by our heroes – a ‘rookie’ (he’s not really, but everyone calls him that) and a grizzled veteran – exploring the streets of Montreal and coming across gritty, real-life problems both big and small, action-packed and funny, that they have to solve, before coming back to the precinct to face the admin, politics and their fellow cops.

Here’s a trailer, followed by the first five minutes or so.

Continue reading “Review: 19-2 (Bravo)”

Superbowl trailers galore, Jesse Eisenberg is Lex Luthor and Back To The Future: The Musical

3 February 2014 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

Film casting

Trailers

Theatre

UK TV

New UK TV shows

  • BBC4 green lights: Detectorists with Mackenzie Crook and The Walshes co-written by Graham Linehan and Diet of Worms

US TV

US TV casting

New US TV show casting

  • David Schwimmer to star in ABC’s remake of Israel’s Bilti Hafich, Irreversible
  • Grace Gummer joins CBS’s Extant
  • Christina Cole and Carole Bouquet joins NBC’s Rosemary’s Baby mini-series
  • Tony Hale to guest on NBC’s About A Boy adaptation
  • Matt McGorry joins ABC’s How To Get Away With Murder, Mike Colter joins TNT’s Agent X
  • Penny Marshall and Lorraine Bracco to guest on Fox’s Mulaney
Weekly Wonder Woman

Review: Justice League – War

31 January 2014 Natalia Romanova 8 Comments

Justice League War

Starring: Jason O’Mara, Alan Tudyk, Justin Kirk, Michelle Monaghan, Christopher Gorham, Shemar Moore, Sean Astin, Steven Blum, Bruce Thomas, Rocky Carroll, Zach Callison, George Newbern
Price: £13.99
Released in the UK: February 4th 2014 (iTunes)

For those who don’t know, quite a sizeable number of superhero comics are produced by DC. You’ve probably heard of the likes of Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern and The Flash, perhaps even Cyborg and Shazam. Collectively known as the Justice League, they’re DC’s top team of superheroes.

Obviously they’ve mostly all been around for a quite few decades now (70+ years in some case) and with comics out every week with different writers, over the years, a lot of contradictory stuff and repetition sets in, so every so often DC likes to ‘reboot’ its universe and go back to the beginning, giving us new angles on characters.

The last time DC did this was a little over two and a half years ago with the so-called nu52/new 52, which effectively reset every character’s history, origins, et al. Sometimes the changes were minimal (Superman’s adoptive parents are both dead again, Batgirl is Barbara Gordon again); sometimes they were quite big (Wonder Woman got an entirely new father, the god Zeus; Barbara Gordon can now walk again).

However, outside the world of comics, things have been a bit laggardly in catching up, with films, merchandising and the like all largely using pre-nu52 imagery and ideas. So behold Justice League – War, the first of DC’s animated movies set in the nu52 mythos. Based on the first six or seven issues of the revamped Justice League comic book (more or less all of which were reviewed on this ‘ere blog when they came out), this is a nu52 origins story for the Justice League showing how the disparate superheroes (and superheroine) came together to fight the DC Universe’s ‘big bad’, Darkseid.

As well as featuring an entirely different, considerably more famous voice cast to previous animated movies, Justice League: War is more adult and better than most DC animated movies that have come before and, in fact, the original comics on which it was based.

Oh yes, and as in the nu52 itself, Superman and Wonder Woman are something of an item. Steve Trevor and Lois Lane? Left standing in the background.

Here’s a trailer:

Continue reading “Review: Justice League – War”

Weekly Wonder Woman

Weekly Wonder Woman: World’s Finest Annual #1 and Forever Evil: ARGUS #4

31 January 2014 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

World's Finest Annual #1

There’s not much in the printed medium out this week Wonder Womany. Despite the cover, over on Earth 2, World’s Finest Annual #1 largely involves a chase after alternative Wonder Woman’s daughter, Fury. Alternative Wondy shows up for a couple of pages towards the end, but it’s more of a cameo than a real appearance.

Alternative Wonder Woman shows up

Alternative Wonder Woman cries about Fury

Meanwhile, over in Forever Evil: ARGUS, again, despite the cover, it’s more of a cameo for Wonder Woman as the assembled heroes and villains realises that arch-Wondy enemy (literally) holds the key to rescuing the Justice League.

Forever Evil: Argus

We also get a little bit of insight into Steve Trevor’s mind, which is largely full of Wonder Woman, apparently.

Steve Trevor's mind is full of Wonder Woman

Lastly, it’s worth noting that over in this week’s Superman, Lois Lane official title of ‘Superman’s best friend’, a title held, pre nu-52, by either Batman or Wonder Woman, depending on the situation. Interesting flip around that.

Oh, and Lois has forgotten Clark and Superman are the same person. How many times did that happen pre-nu52? Lots, anyway, nostalgia fans.

Lois is Clark's best friend