Spoiler fiends are the truest afficionados of media SF. We're endlessly curious about everything: we actually care about drunken superhero Hancock's sex life, and exactly what Mulder and Scully's status is in X-Files 2. We pore over toy announcements to decipher the secret of Doctor Who's season finale, and read between the lines to dope out Smallville's next female villain. We scan every bit of new Speed Racer footage, and comb through hints about Heroes season three. We spy on Lost's finale shooting. We even pay attention to the reports about Eureka's next season and news about Star Wars books, that's how omnivorous we are. If it's a spoiler, we're interested.
Speed Racer:
On the heels of its featurette about Racer X, IGN Movies has a 3-minute clip featuring Speed Racer himself. It's mostly footage we've already featured, but I think there might be a teeny bit more of it. [IGN Movies]
X-Files: I Want To Believe:
X-Files 2 features a scene between Mulder and Scully in the FBI offices. And Scully is struggling with the conflict between her rational scientific outlook and her faith (as a Catholic.) Mulder is still struggling with his faith in the paranormal. [XFilesNews]
Hancock:
That scene in Hancock where the slovenly superhero has sex with an underage girl? It's been cut, to try and get the film a PG-13 rating instead of an R rating. Apparently there was a scene where he gets drunk and fools around with a 12-year-old too, but that was mostly a "bargaining chip" to try and convince the ratings board to let a similar scene involving a 17-year-old stay in. But now all the underage girls are gone. The movie is about "why Superman can't get a date," and involves Hancock being physically unable to spend the night with a woman he meets at a party. (Because of the "woman of tissue paper" thing, or something else?) [New York Times]
The Happening:
M. Night Shyamalan's The Happening is a 90-minute paranoia movie, which pays tribute to Invasion Of The Body Snatchers. A group of people are trying to get out of an area affected by some other-worldly threat, and they understand the situation better than everyone around them... but nobody else will listen. [LA Times, via Defamer]
Doctor Who:
The title of episode 12 of Doctor Who's current season is still a mystery, but fans are speculating it could be "War On Skaro." (Skaro is the name of the evil Daleks' home planet, which has been destroyed a couple of times.) After all, British toymaker Play.com has started taking preorders on a "War On Skaro" playset, which goes on sale in October. And the playset includes a Davros action figure. [Room 515]
In next week's episode, "The Doctor's Daughter," the daughter in question says "Hello, Dad!" to the Doctor. And she wields a machine gun. And the aliens in the episode, the Hath, are half fish, half human, and communicate using bubbles. [SciFiPulse]
Heroes:
Heroes' Noah Bennett, aka HRG, is currently imprisoned at the bottom of Level Five in the Company's secret facility. "I think there may be an escape in the offing, but at a cost," says actor Jack Coleman. And HRG will probably be hunting those escaped psycho villains who are like a dozen Sylars. Meanwhile, Mohinder is getting a lot less mild-mannered, and Claire wants to use her powers for a greater good instead of just blending in. And I'm not sure what to make of Coleman's prediction for Hiro:
"He's firmly planted in Yakamoto Industries now," says Coleman. "I think Hiro's more the guy who starts out wealthy and comfortable and is very unhappy taking over his father's business and needs the quest. That's his destiny."[Heroes Television]
Smallville:
Even though Michael Rosenbaum just announced he's through with Smallville, the producers are still dropping hints he may be back for the eighth season finale, which may be the show's finale episode ever. Also, all the signs point to the show's new female villain being Maxima, the alien queen who wanted to marry Superman in the comics and wasn't willing to take no for an answer. And apparently this time around, Clark may not want to give no for an answer anyway. [ComicBookResources]
Lost:
Castaway drama Lost just filmed a scene for the season finale in which the Oceanic Six (plus Sawyer, and some person who's not moving) swim onto a life raft. (And it looks like Desmond might be there too.) [Ryan's Flickr page, via Approaching Lost]
Also, in Thursday's episode, Claire goes into Jacob's Cabin with Locke, and we learn more about why we saw her dad (and Jack's) in there. We see Ben's father figure Horace Godspeed (who got Ben's dad his job and died in the purge) back from the dead. And Michael and Frank argue on the freighter. [Nicole's Lost]
Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles:
We will see some more of the mysterious girl at John Connor's high school, Cheri, again at some point in TV's Terminator spinoff. But season two of the Sarah Connor Chronicles will move towards having one plot per episode, instead of juggling three or four plots every time. And the show's second season will flip some of its character dynamics on their head, as John becomes more of a man instead of a boy. [IGN]
Eureka:
Do any of you guys watch the Sci Fi Channel's Eureka, the show about a town full of supergeniuses and weirdos? If so, then you'll be happy to hear that Sheriff Jack Carter may actually get a girlfriend in the new season. Also getting lucky in love may be Sally, the Smart House and possibly even Fargo. The new season will also include a Biodome-themed show, a Groundhog Day riff involving "2 AM and ice water," a "robot mangy dog show," and maybe more disappearing pizza guys. Eight episodes of the new season will air starting in late July, with the rest airing later. [Monsters And Critics]
Star Wars:
The blurb for the upcoming Star Wars novel Millennium Falcon gives some spoilers about what happens in the earlier novel, Invincible. The brief-but-brutal rain of Darth Caedus (worst "Darth" name ever) comes to an end, and the formerly evil Imperial Admiral Daala unites the galaxy to forge a lasting peace. Luke Skywalker tries to chart a new future for the Jedi Order and tries to understand why his nephew Jacen Solo turned to the Dark Side. Leia and Han, grieving for both their dead sons, adopt Jacen's force-sensitive daughter Allana, at the request of her mother, Queen Tenel Ka of Hapes. The newly formed family goes off to research the history of Han's ship the Millennium Falcon, but then they stumble on a new threat to the Jedi Order — and maybe to the Force itself. [The Force.net]
And the blurb for the first graphic novel based on the new Clone Wars movie/series has gone up on Amazon: In "Shipyards of Doom," Obi Wan and Anakin lead a mission to destroy the Separatists' shipyards, but the enemy finds out. They're forced to rely on their new wet-behind-the-ears padawan, Ahsoka, who must face the droid armies of General Grievous. [Amazon]














Comments
I came late to Eureka but gotta say that I do like it.
It's never gonna set the world on fire as a drama, but it is bloody good fun...
And doh! Made a point of avoiding the spoilers for LOTF: Invincible attached to the Millenium Falcon blurb on theforce.net, and now I've just read it. Bugger!
Eureka is silly, but fun. A guilty pleasure.
@Belabras: Yup, its campy as hell but oh so fun!
The gadgetry alone makes it an engineers wet dream.
Why is Darth Caedus the worst Sith name ever? Is there a pun there I'm missing?
If I go bad, my Sith name will be "Darth Egregious."
I really like Eureka too, but last year really teetered out in a pretty lame way. Also, the science-disaster-of-the-week became really, really, predictable.
Also the Smart House's name is SARAH*, not sally. That would be weird if she has a boyfriend though...
*its an acronym I don't know offhand.
"Shipyards of Doom." Sounds exciting. Can't wait for the second chapter, "Tool Shed of Elemental Evil."
Darth Millenial is waaaay worse than Darth Caedus
just sayin'
I'm so glad I gave up Star Wars novels. Thank you, Kevin J. Anderson.
Eureka is fun. There are worse ways to relax on a summer evening.
Eh, Caedus was chosen by the fans for some reason. They actually had an online poll to decide the name. It will be interesting to see if the NJO books will stick to the events that the comics put forth. The Sith are all on Korriban under someone named Darth Krayt, and Jacen is just kind of their pawn so the Jedi don't finger them.
I love Eureka, though at times it can become predictable.
Hear is to hoping they can bring some originality to what is already an original idea.
Ah, Star Wars novels. When do we get to debate their place in Star Wars lore?
@extracrispy: Me too. Once the "New Jedi Order" kicked in, I gave up.
BOTH sons dead? Honestly, what's the f***ing point of this series? Leia and Han are like 60 years old by now, and their kids keep dying.
It went from Star Wars to a goddamn Greek tragedy. Who makes these decisions? Ugh.
Oh, boy. A "terminator of the week".
Yawwwwn.
"Sarah Connor Chronicles will move towards having one plot per episode, instead of juggling three or four plots every time"
One Plot per episode can only spell doom for any series...
A little complexity goes a long way and is appreciated by viewers who have a "brain" instead of the teeming masses of mindless worms that make up usual TV viewers.
I like Eureka because it's on when nothing else is and it stops when everything else comes back.
And in regards to the Hancock stuff, it should add some interesting insight into Kevin Smith's "shotgun blast through the back" theory of superheroic sperm.
I also hope that scene makes it to the inevitable "unrated" DVD version.
@Spoony Bard: traditionally moving from star wars to greek tragedy would be considered a step up in the literary hierarchy, not down.
I hope I get to be
Darth Indifferent
when I turn to the dark side.
@SeeingI: I think mine would be either Darth TheBunny or Darth Blank.
@tetracycloide: Yes, but the two should never meet. It's like oil and water, really - if I want to see fun derring-do adventures, I go with Star Wars and Indiana Jones. If I want to see tragedy and heartbreaking plot twists, I have plenty of other options. Why foist those on the SW Universe?
Re: Coleman quote
It's Yamagato. Sigh.
Either way, Heroes better step it up after that boring-ass second season.
@dOk: (Sarah Connor Chron's) Agreed. Oh man! That's the worst thing they can do. This show has so much potential, I'd REALLY hate to see it deteriorate into the average slosh.
@Plague: Seriously!
@zenpoet: Yeah, I loved season one, season two was like, yeah OK. I hope they go back to the roots with this season.
@Aethyr: I dunno, it was OK, but it seemed very rushed at times. Kristen Bell = WIN, but losing hot shapeshifter actress and replacing her with not-so-hot shapeshifter actress was probably the reason for shapeshifter's early demise. Which was a shame. It's like, you may lose the actors, but you never lose their powers, what with at least two power-sponges hanging around. Probably more. I'm excited, though, despite everything :-)
(But not as excited as I am for Charlie's Doctor Who-review due later! Hint hint!)
Well I'm getting all my X-Files spoilers from X-Files news and the Haven so everytime I come here, I feel all smug.Also, I'm dreaming about Mulder and Scully sex way too much lately.Kbye!
That's Sayid in the life raft, not Desmond.
Whoa. Underage sex? In my Will Smith summer popcorn flick? O_O
As for Lost, they better not kill off Desmond. I'm serious, they will summon The Rage in me, if they kill off Desmond. I mean, he's with Sayid, but he's not one of The Six...
Love Eureka, still think the Smith flick will suck, and agree a hurtin' will be put on anyone who kills off Des.
@Gospel X: Nah, but I think we get to debate its place in George's tax return ;P
Glad to know Eureka is not too far off. Just wish it would have a longer season.
REIGN
not rain.
that is all.
The brief-but-brutal of Darth Caedus (worst "Darth" name ever) comes to an end, and the formerly evil Imperial Admiral Daala unites the galaxy to forge a lasting peace.
@malenfantreid: The brief-but-brutal rain of Darth Caedus (worst "Darth" name ever) comes to an end, and the formerly evil Imperial Admiral Daala unites the galaxy to forge a lasting peace.
I like Eureka, I think Hancock will be a decent flick (though not the best ever by any stretch of the imagination), and Heroes needs to really explore what they have built instead of adding things constantly.
@Log1c:
The house on Eureka is indeed called Sarah. But it's not an acronym. When it's first introduced, Fargo explains they were considering it for mass production and would feature the voice of Buffy's Sarah Michelle Gellar. (It's implied Fargo is a huge Buffy fan on Season 1). When the sheriff notices Sarah is actually Fargo impersonating SMG's voice, he replies nervously: we never actually closed that voice talent license deal.
Eureka is a guilty pleasure indeed.
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