The Zocalo Today – March 17, 2007

NEWS FROM JMS - COMIC BOOK UPDATE

Q: Will there be any books or comics coming out in conjunction with
B5 Lost Tales?

A: No plans for any as such, though there may be a mini-comic
included in the DVD, but that's still in the yes/no stage.

Q) Is Thor your only ongoing at Marvel right now? What other comics
are you writing right now?

A: I'm still finishing up on Amazing Spider-Man, with 2 of the
regular book and 2 of the "One More Day" mini to write, and then I'm
off. One more issue of "Ultimate Power" to write before handing the
baton off to Jeph Loeb to finish the mini (Bendis did the first 3,
I'm doing the middle 3, with Loeb last in rotation). Working on Thor
as an ongoing title, the only monthly in addition to The Book of Lost
Tales, which will be coming back shortly. Also doing a 12 issue maxi
series tentatively called "The Twelve" that will be bringing back a
bunch of WW2 era Marvel heroes not seen since then.

TIDBITS
Xombie episode 9 is on line now! Go to
http://www.xombified.com/index.html to view. Former B5 dolly grip
Kenny Yakkel is co-producer. He also points out that Pat Tallman
(Lyta) talks about about his latest illustrated novel, Xombie: Dead
On Arrival.

DISCUSSION TOPIC:
Here is a really hard discussion topic for you – one you will have to
ponder for a bit before you answer.

If you had to describe Babylon 5 and why it was different from any
other science fiction program, what would you say?

Send your comments to sgbruckner@... and I'll post them so that
other readers will be able to share your views and comments.

BABYLON PODCAST #58
March 14, 2007
Posted by Summer

Jeffrey tells us all about his newest project, producing episodes for
HGTV's "Over Your Head". Then, for some reason, we venture into
Vorlon-morphed TV show names, and that game continues in the chatroom
for at least 20 more minutes after we cut to the first break.
Brad from Podculture is busy adopting B5 novels that he's finding in
used book stores in his area, and we'll have those available. Not
sure how yet, but we'll figure something out.

Deep Geeking: Tim and Summer delve into discussion about "Hunter,
Prey". In this episode, Sheridan begins to deal directly with Kosh,
and the staff begins to wonder more closely about the hints dropped
about Vorlon ship technology.

After being informed that Dr Everett Jacobs, the former presidential
physician, is a wanted fugitive, and initiating a search for him by
station security, Sheridan learns that all that he has been told
about Jacobs may not be what it seems. He was reluctant to believe in
Franklin's support of Jacobs, until being informed by a liasion from
General Hague that Jacobs is being hunted because he may possess
information damaging to Clark's given rationale for leaving Earth
Force One before it exploded.

We also see Kosh begin to interact more with Sheridan, and even deign
to instruct him in the finer points of being himself.

"Hunter, Prey" is available for download from iTunes.

Listener Feedback: It's all email, all the time for this show.
Jefferson in the UK chimes in for Jeff's call for UK listeners; Loz
comments on GROPOS and who's sleeping (or not sleeping) around; Greg
clarifies the content in a few of the necessary of B5 novelizations;
Katrina in PA wants to know what our Top 5 and Bottom 5 shows for the
entire series might be; Tim wants to know what Jeff's personal Top 5
and Bottom 5 in terms of production were.

Go to Babylon Podcast to listen to all of the previous broadcasts or
visit Podcasts for the collection.

NEW SCI-FI PUBLICATIONS

TV Zone Special #75: BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER - 10 years. Celebrate
the 10th anniversary of one of Cult Television's greatest series with
interviews, overviews and some surprises… This issue includes: A
History in Quotes -- Sarah Michelle Gellar, James Marsters, Anthony
Stewart Head, and more, in their own words. Cast interviews - Buffy's
mom, Kristine Sutherland, the geek who became a Superstar, Danny
Strong, and the villain who came good, Adam Busch.

ISSUE A14: HEROES EXCLUSIVE! Join the show's creator Tim Kring and
the cast to explore the show that has become a TV phenomenon, and
discover why this is a superhero series like no other. Also in this
issue: Jane Austen Season Exclusive! Meet the stars of ITV's upcoming
season of three Jane Austen classics, Billie Piper, Rupert Penry-
Jones, JJ Feild and Julia Davis. 300 - the director and cast talk to
us about their extraordinary big-budget CGI adaptation of the Frank
Miller graphic novel.

NEW COMIC BOOKS:

TV AVENGERS feature in new Comics International

Fans of John Steed, Cathy Gale, Emma Peel et al might want to scurry
on down to their local comics shop for a copy of Comics International
#201, the 100-page first issue from new publisher Cosmic
Publications. The long-running news magazine is continuing its
exhaustive overview at TV fantasy in comics with a detailed and
heavily illustrated look at The Avengers, written by John Freeman,
Ian Wheeler and Dez Skinn. (B5 fans will remember John Freeman as the
editor of the fabulous Babylon 5 magazine.

BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER
Dark Horse comics, which just released the first issue of a new Buffy
the Vampire Slayer " season eight" comic, announced that it will
order a second printing. Orders have exceeded the initial printing of
more than 100,000 copies of the comic, from Buffy creator Joss
Whedon, which picks up the story of the Sunnydale Slayer from the end
of the show's seventh and final season on TV. "Admittedly, our
expectations were already gigantic, but this has surpassed even
those," Dirk Wood, Dark Horse's director of marketing, said in a
statement. "We couldn't be happier about how this has launched and
have high hopes for upcoming issues." The upcoming second printing
will feature a full-bleed version of the Jo Chen cover, with some of
the design elements removed for a cleaner look, the company said. The
new version will arrive in stores with an on-sale date of March 28, a
week before the release of issue number two.

NEWS FROM AROUND THE WORLD OF SCIENCE FICTION:
SHERLOCK HOLMES
According to Variety, Warner Bros. Pictures will adapt Lionel
Wigram's upcoming comic, SHERLOCK HOLMES, for the big screen. Neil
Marshall has signed on to direct the film based on a script from
Michael Johnson. The exact storyline is being kept under wraps, but
creative executives at Warners say they are looking for
the "Sherlock" team to reinvent the sleuth and his loyal No. 2 Dr.
Watson in much the same edgy way that Christopher Nolan has re-
imagined Batman for the studio. The comic shines a more adventuresome
(think Indiana Jones) light on the character of Sherlock Holmes and
includes him bare knuckle boxing as well as being an expert
swordsman.

BATTLESTAR GALACTICA
variety reports that Dick Eick, executive producer for BATTLESTAR
GALACTICA, has renewed his first-look deal at NBC Universal even as
he continues expanding his development roster to non-NBCU properties.
Eick, who this spring is shepherding the NBC reimagining of THE
BIONIC WOMAN and the Fox thriller THEM, has set up a pair of projects
at F/X. One, a drama script, reteams him with BATTLESTAR partner
Ronald D. Moore. He's also in talks to produce a miniseries for
Lifetime. At SCI FI Channel, Eick continues working with Moore on
CAPRICA, the potential Battlestar prequel spinoff, from writer Remi
Aubuchon. He's also teamed with Matt Cirulnick to develop the SCI FI
miniseries about the end of days. SCI FI recently renewed Battlestar
for a fourth season.

SPIDER-MAN 4
It may be a while before anyone starts thinking about SPIDER-MAN 4,
according to Kirsten Dunst. While at the ShowWest convention in Las
Vegas, Durst said that it's time for a break from the
franchise. "Well, I think [director] Sam [Raimi] has dedicated so
much of his life, like more than 10 years, to the Spider-Man
franchise with so much passion and love, the man is burnt out at this
time. I think he needs a long vacation to put his creativity towards
something else, and then maybe we'll revisit it," Durst said. Told
that Sony Pictures has ordered a fourth script and was willing to
move ahead with or without Raimi, Dunst added: "Do they want to give
Sam Raimi a heart attack? That's evil. Sorry, that's not happening
anytime soon. I would just say no for Sam's sake so that he can have
a break. We would all do it together, because Sam, Tobey [Maguire]
and I are a team now, but there's no way it's going to happen very
soon. I just can't imagine that. We don't have the story to tell
right now." SPIDER-MAN 3 opens May 4.

BABYLON A.D. RESUMES PRODUCTION
BABYLON A.D., Vin Diesel's SF adventure movie, has resumed shooting
in the Czech Republic after a two-week hiatus to sort out problems,
Variety reported. Mathieu Kassovitz is directing the $60 million
movie. Producer Ilan Goldman told the trade paper that the
difficulties were routine for any big-scale film, including
uncooperative weather and problems with set construction. After a
fruitless scouting mission to Iceland, the production still needs to
find a location with snow for footage that will take six to eight
days to shoot, Goldman said. Kassovitz, Diesel and co-stars Michelle
Yeoh and French actress Melanie Thierry are due on March 16 in the
Czech city of Ostrava, where they will spend the next week shooting
scenes for the futuristic action-thriller, based on a cult novel by
Maurice Dantec. In the film, Diesel plays a mercenary hired to escort
a young woman (Thierry) who has been genetically tampered with,
containing a virus that could destroy the human race. Yeoh plays a
nun accompanying the young girl.

NBCU WIRELESS SHOWS
NBC Universal and MobiTV Inc. announced a deal to make programming
available over U.S. wireless networks for the first time, including
episodes of SCI FI Channel's BATTLESTAR GALACTICA and NBC's HEROES.
The two companies will also offer select short-form programming from
Bravo, SCI FI Channel, USA Network, Telemundo and mun2 on five new ad-
supported channels to subscribers, which will debut on the MobiTV
service in the second quarter. Consumers will be able to access full
episodes of select NBCU prime-time shows, starting at $1.99 for a 24-
hour viewing period (subject to change). The programming will include
current seasons of shows produced by NBCU Television Studios. Several
ad-supported on-demand shows will also be available at no additional
charge from within the MobiTV base subscription channel package.

STARGATE SG-1 CONTEST
The United Kingdom's Sky One is asking viewers to vote for their
favorite Stargate SG-1 episodes and enter a contest to win an
autographed SG-1 script and a complete set of DVDs at the network's
Web site; the winning episodes will air March 31- April 1. For more
information, go to
http://domain1282827.sites.fasthosts.com/stargate.html.

MEET THE ROBINSONS
Stephen Anderson, director of Disney's upcoming SF animated movie
MEET THE ROBINSONS, said in a recent interview that the 3-D movie
makes a few sly references to that other science-fiction Family
Robinson: the one from TV's LOST IN SPACE. "Oh, sure, the character
of Wilbur Robinson may invoke a memory of that Robinsons in space,"
Anderson admitted in an interview at the Disney Animation Building in
Burbank, Calif. Bill Mumy's character in Lost in Space was also named
Will Robinson. MEET THE ROBINSONS tells the story of an orphan genius
named Lewis who goes off to seek his birth family and meets a
stranger from the future named Wilbur Robinson, who whisks the boy
off in a time machine. The story is from William Joyce's book, A Day
With Wilbur Robinson, and Anderson said he talked to the author about
the not-so-subtle references. "It is about any family that may be out
there," Anderson said. "It also references [The] Swiss Family
Robinson, too. It's an homage of his to all those things." (The 1812
Swiss Family Robinson was the inspiration for Lost in Space.) MEET
THE ROBINSONS features the voices of Angela Bassett, Tom Selleck,
Laurie Metcalf, Adam West, Ethan Sandler and Tom Kenny. The movie is
expected to be the widest 3-D film release ever when it opens March
30 on more than 600 specially equipped screens. It will also play in
conventional theaters.

INDIANA JONES 4
The Hollywood Reporter indicates that Cate Blanchett has signed on to
star in the fourth installment of the Indiana Jones adventures.
Harrison Ford already has boarded the project, which will be produced
by Lucasfilm and directed by Steven Spielberg. With David Koepp's
screenplay shrouded in secrecy, it is unclear what character
Blanchett will play. Shooting will begin in June in Los Angeles and
at undisclosed locations around the world. Paramount Pictures will
release Indy 4 around the world on May 22, 2008, with a handful of
territories opening the following day. Frank Marshall is producing,
with George Lucas and Kathleen Kennedy executive-producing.

DAVID DUCHOVNY RETURNS TO TV
According to reports in The Hollywood Reporter, Showtime has handed
out a series order to an untitled comedy starring David Duchovny. The
network has picked up 12 episodes of the project, originally ordered
as a pilot last year. Written by Tom Kapinos, the untitled series
centers on novelist Hank Moody (Duchovny) who struggles to raise his
13-year-old daughter (Madeleine Martin), while still carrying a torch
for his ex-girlfriend (Natascha McElhone). His obsession with truth-
telling and self-destructive behavior -- drinks, drugs and
relationships -- are both destroying and enriching his career. The
series, which co-stars Madeleine Martin, Madeline Zima and Evan
Handler, is slated to begin production in June for an August launch.
It marks Duchovny's first series gig since Fox's "The X-Files."

VERONICA MARS
Kristen Bell is hard to forget. The Veronica Mars star has nabbed the
title role in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, a "romantic disaster movie"
about a man trying to forget his TV sitcom star ex-girlfriend. Judd
Apatow (Talladega Nights) and Shauna Robertson produce, with Jason
Segel (How I Met Your Mother) set to play the down-and-out dumpee.
This news come atop rumors that VERONICA MARS has been cancelled by
The CW.

STARGATE: CONTINUUM
As we reported last week, MGM is moving forward with Stargate SG-1
movies. They will shoot scenes in the Arctic, north of Alaska, for
the upcoming straight-to-DVD film STARGATE: CONTINUUM, with the
cooperation of the U.S. Navy's Applied Physics Laboratory Ice
Station. Cast members Ben Browder and Amanda Tapping will travel to
the facility, about 200 nautical miles north of Alaska's Prudhoe Bay,
to shoot during the week of March 23-29. Martin Wood, director of
more than 70 episodes of Stargate SG-1 and its spinoff series,
Stargate Atlantis, is directing. STARGATE: CONTINUUM, which is being
co-financed by MGM and 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, will
shoot a variety of scenes on location at the station, where
temperatures drop to 50 below zero. In addition to the frigid outdoor
environments, the filming will also involve the U.S. Navy submarine
U.S.S. Alexandria, MGM said. Among the dramatic scenes to be filmed
at the location: the submarine as it bursts through the ice and into
the arctic air. MGM gave the green light to two direct-to-video
movies based on Stargate SG-1. The first movie, STARGATE: THE ARC OF
THE TRUTH, which is also being co-financed by MGM and 20th Century
Fox Home Entertainment, begins production on April 15. The second
movie, STARGATE: CONTINUUM, will resume filming on May 22 after
comleting the ice-station scenes. Written and produced by Brad Wright
and Robert Cooper, the new movies will also feature Christopher
Judge, Claudia Black, Beau Bridges and Michael Shanks. In STARGATE:
CONTINUUM, SG-1 attends the execution of Ba'al, the last of the
goa'uld system lords, when Teal'c (Judge) and Vala (Black)
inexplicably disappear into thin air. Carter (Tapping), Daniel
(Shanks) and Mitchell (Browder) race back to a world where history
has been changed: The Stargate program has been erased from the
timeline. As they try to convince the authorities of what's happened,
a fleet of goa'uld motherships arrives in orbit, led by Ba'al; his
queen, Katesh (Vala); and his first prime, Teal'c. SG-1 must find the
Stargate and set things right before the world is enslaved by the
goa'uld.

TIN MAN
Zooey Deschanel will star in SCI FI Channel's original miniseries TIN
MAN. In a recent interview, she said that it will be surprisingly
dark, though it's based on L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of
Oz. "It's really kind of dark," Deschanel (Bridge to Terabithia) said
in an interview. "It will be fascinating to see what they do with
it." Deschanel spoke at a preview of her upcoming animated film,
SURF'S UP, last week. "I'm leaving in three weeks for Vancouver,
where we'll shoot it, and I'm [the] Dorothy [character]," Deschanel
said. She added that she is particularly excited about working with
Alan Cumming, who co-stars as Glitch, and Oscar winner Richard
Dreyfuss as the wizard-like Mystic Man. Tin Man (a working title)
follows Deschanel's character, who is called DG, as she enters
another world, where she must discover her true identity. In a realm
called the O.Z., she battles evil winged monkey-bats and attempts to
fulfill her destiny in a perilous journey on the fabled Old Road,
which leads to the Mystic Man. Along the way, she is joined by
Glitch, a man missing half his brain; Raw, a quietly powerful
wolverine-like creature longing for inner courage; and Cain, a heroic
former policeman (known in the O.Z. as a Tin Man, for his tin badge),
seeking vengeance for his scarred heart. Deschanel said she and her
companions are "not really the Wizard of Oz characters. It's just a
hint at those characters. So it's not like I'm going to go back and
watch the [1939] movie and do a Judy Garland thing or anything like
that." The six-hour Tin Man is expected to air on SCI FI Channel in
December.

PRISONER
Julian McMahon has been one busy fella. In a recent interview he said
that he is now completing PRISONER, a psychological horror thriller
with supernatural overtones. "Prisoner is a pretty kind of intense
movie," McMahon said. "It's about a guy who's this arrogant filmmaker
who gets in prisons, and it's a very psychologically orientated
imprisonment. It's a little trippy like this movie is, and I guess
that throughout the movie you wonder if he was actually really in
prison or if it was his own spell that he put himself under." The
film—which is not to be confused with the proposed remake of Patrick
McGoohan's 1960s British TV series—is an independent feature written
and directed by both David Alford and Robert Lynne. It centers on a
Hollywood director (McMahon) who is scouting locations for a prison
movie and ends up being imprisoned. It's unclear whether things are
really happening, or whether they are taking place in the character's
mind. Or something else. "Hopefully, he comes out of it at the end as
a better man, or at least having learned something," McMahon said.
Elias Koteas (Skinwalkers) plays the jailer; Dagmara Dominczyk, Kim
Raver, Rocky Carroll and Tom Guiry are also in the cast for the
movie, which shot in Tennessee. "It's great fun," McMahon said. "[I]
was working with Elias Koteas, and we were stuck in a prison cell for
five weeks or something. It was pretty intense." McMahon will next be
seen alongside Sandra Bullock in the time-travel romance Premonition,
which opens March 16. He will also reprise the role of Victor Von
Doom in the upcoming FANTASTIC FOUR: RISE OF THE SILVER SURFER, which
opens June 15.

PAINKILLER JANE
The SciFi Channel is ready to debut the original series PAINKILLER
JANE, starring starring Kristanna Loken on April 13 at 10 p.m. ET/PT.
It will join STARGATE SG-1 and STARGATE ATLANTIS on the Friday night
schedule. Based on the comic book created by Jimmy Palmiotti and Joe
Quesada, Painkiller Jane follows the adventures of Jane Vasco
(Loken), a kick-ass heroine with remarkable self-healing powers.
Formerly a hard-nosed DEA agent, Jane is recruited by a covert
government organization tasked with capturing "Neuros," which are
genetically enhanced people with superhuman powers of the mind.
During the course of her first investigation with the team, she
discovers that she also has extraordinary abilities that render her
impervious to permanent injury, if not pain. PAINKILLER JANE is
executive-produced by showrunner Gil Grant (24). Loken will serve as
co-executive producer. Following the debut of the show's 22 one-hour
episodes on SCI FI, the series will have a domestic broadcast weekly
syndication window in the fall. Starz Media will handle U.S. DVD and
syndication sales, as well as distribution to key worldwide markets.

I'M IN HELL
You'll love the title of this new half-hour supernatural-themed
sitcom pilot. CBS has picked up I'M IN HELL, a single-camera sitcom
pilot, which will mark the prime- time series debut of Jason Biggs
(American Pie), Variety reported. Aron Abrams and Greg Thompson wrote
the CBS Paramount project and will executive-produce. Biggs will play
Nick, a Wall Street maven who's killed in a Blackberry-related car
accident. Since hell's overcrowded, he's assigned to "hell on Earth,"
a new life devoid of all the trappings of his previous existence and
in which Murphy's Law is always just around the corner. Biggs and
Peter Kiernan will serve as producers.

SURF'S UP
Jeff Bridges, who voices a legendary surfer penguin in this summer's
animated film SURF'S UP, said in a recent interview that he
essentially channels The Dude from The Big Lebowski. "Yeah, I guess
you could say that Big Z is the Dude of the penguins," Bridges said.
SURF'S UP is a computer-animated film that uses a mock-documentary
style to tell the story of a young penguin surfer, Cody Maverick
(Shia LaBeouf), who seeks the counsel of Bridges' Big Z. Bridges said
that signed on to the Sony Pictures Animation project after the
filmmakers showed him test animation of his character, which was
created using Bridges' dialogue from The Big Lebowski. Directors Ash
Brannon and Chris Buck had Bridges in mind for Big Z all along. "We
only thought of him doing the role," Brannon said. "He is like this
in all his movies, and as we were developing the character, we knew
he was the right guy, the only guy, for the part." Bridges co-stars
with Jon Heder, Zooey Deschanel and James Wood in SURF'S UP, which is
scheduled to open on June 8.

THE GIVER
According to Variety, Warner Brothers has acquired screen rights to
Lois Lowry's Newbery Award-winning SF novel THE GIVER. Red Wagon
partners Douglas Wick and Lucy Fisher will produce. The story follows
a 12-year-old boy living in a futuristic, emotionally suppressed
utopian society. He's selected to bear his community's emotional
history; as he's loaded up with long-discarded feelings like fear and
pleasure, the youth realizes that living a pain-free life comes at a
high cost. The novel has been under continuous option since its
publication to great fanfare in 1994, but never made it to a
production start. Screen rights reverted back to Lowry on March 1;
Warner had a preemptive offer on the table by March 10 and struck a
deal that evening, once Lowry was tracked down on vacation in
Florida.

THE TALISMAN
According to the Hollywood Reporter, Turner Broadcasting System
executives told advertisers that THE TALISMAN, a limited series from
Steven Spielberg and DreamWorks Television that will air on TNT in
2008, could become a series in 2009. The announcement was made March
6 at New York's Museum of Modern Art as part of a presentation on
TBS, TNT, Court TV, Turner's broadband site Super Deluxe and Turner
Sports. Spielberg will executive-produce a six-hour miniseries based
on Stephen King and Peter Straub's best-selling supernatural thriller
THE TALISMAN for the summer of 2008, with DreamWorks Television
producing. Spielberg, who produced Into the West for TNT, will be
joined by his longtime partner Kathleen Kennedy as executive
producer, along with Ehren Kruger (Skeleton Key, The Ring), who will
adapt the King/Straub novel. Darryl Frank, who heads up DreamWorks
Television, will be co-executive producer, along with Justin Falvey.
THE TALISMAN, which was published in 1984, marked the first
collaboration between King and Straub. It tells the story of Jack
Sawyer, a boy who goes on a quest through this world and through a
parallel world known as "The Territories" on a mission to obtain a
mysterious talisman that will save his dying mother's life and that
of her "twinner," the Queen of the Territories.

BRYAN SINGER PROJECT
Variety reports that United Artists' Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner have
greenlit their second film, an original thriller that Bryan Singer
will direct as his next feature. The untitled film re-teams Singer
with The Usual Suspects screenwriter Chris McQuarrie. Singer and
McQuarrie will produce. Set in WWII, the project is similar
to "Suspects" in that it is a multi-character ensemble piece. Singer
and McQuarrie took the project directly to Wagner and Cruise, who
agreed to finance it almost immediately. The film will delay Warner
Bros.' hope of mounting a sequel to SUPERMAN RETURNS in the near
future, adds the trade. Singer's Bad Hat Harry production company has
an overall deal at WB, where he is developing several films that
include that sequel and the Harvey Milk biopic The Mayor of Castro
Street. Singer is also directing "Football Wives," a series pilot for
ABC and ABC TV Studio. The new project begins production this summer.

DOCTOR SEUSS FILM
Variety reports that Carol Burnett, Seth Rogen, Will Arnett, Isla
Fisher, Dan Fogler, Amy Poehler, Dane Cook, Jaime Pressly and Jonah
Hill will voice roles in the upcoming animated film HORTON HEARS A
WHO, starring Jim Carrey and Steve Carell and based on the Dr. Seuss
book.

RATATOUILLE
According to ComingSoon, director Brad Bird has revealed that Peter
O'Toole will do voice work for the upcoming Pixar film, Ratatouille.
O'Toole will reportedly voice a food critic named Anton Ego. In the
film, a rat named Remy dreams of becoming a great French chef despite
his family's wishes and the obvious problem of being a rat in a
decidedly rodent-phobic profession. When fate places Remy in the
sewers of Paris, he finds himself ideally situated beneath a
restaurant made famous by his culinary hero, Auguste Gusteau. Despite
the apparent dangers of being an unlikely - and certainly unwanted -
visitor in the kitchen of a fine French restaurant, Remy's passion
for cooking soon sets into motion a hilarious and exciting rat race
that turns the culinary world of Paris upside down. The film hits
theaters on June 29, 2007.

ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK
Hot from his current film 300, Gerard Butler is at the center of a
package that Creative Artists Agency began shopping on March 12: a
remake of John Carpenter's 1981 SF action movie ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK.
Variety reports Neal Moritz is attached to produce, with BLACK HAWK
DOWN writer Ken Nolan penning the screenplay. A deal is expected to
be made this week. Butler would play Snake Plissken, the one-eyed
convict originated by Kurt Russell, who's charged with heading into
the inescapable maximum security prison formerly known as Manhattan
to liberate the U.S. president. Russell reprised the role in the 1996
sequel Escape From L.A.

THE HOST
Bong Joon-ho, director of the Korean-language monster movie THE HOST,
said in a recent interview that Universal Studios will remake the
film for American audiences and that he hopes they do the original
film justice. The studio has purchased the rights to THE HOST, which
centers on a dysfunctional family that must overcome its differences
to save its daughter, who's been grabbed by a creature that an
unresponsive government declares is the host of an unidentified
virus. The film, which was a huge hit in Korea and Asia, opened March
9 in limited release in North America and made $314,488 on 71
screens, a healthy per-screen average of $4,429, the
BoxOfficeMojo.com Web site reported. "Maybe three or four years down
the line, if THE HOST [remake] comes out, and there's a cool director
who takes it on and makes it a real great film, then I'd be very
happy," Bong said through a translator. "On the other hand, if it's
just crap, I think I'd be happy, too, because then people would be
like, 'Oh, yeah, Bong's original was really good.' So, for me, it's a
win-win situation. Universal has a tradition of doing horror and
creature films, so I anticipate that they will do a great film."
Bong's next film will be a Korean production of a more intimate, non-
genre nature, but the film after that likely will be a big-screen
adaptation of the French SF comic book La Transperceneige by Jacques
Lob and Jean-Marc Rochette. The story follows the last remnants of
mankind who, following a second ice age, live aboard a train. "It's
about the struggles and fights that go on even in such a critical
state," Bong said. "There's the tension. There's the fighting, and
that appeals to me also. Outside, it's like ice, but inside it's
bubbling over, all these human emotions and whatnot. The contrast
there is interesting. I want to keep the tension going. And I think
everyone feels the charm of a train." THE HOST is now playing in
theaters.

BABYLON FIELDS
According to the Hollywood Reporter, Jamey Sheridan has joined CBS'
supernatural drama pilot BABYLON FIELDS, about a Long Island town
where the dead come to life; Sheridan will play a zombie, a former
bullying man and a wife-beater.

CHANGES AT MARVEL
Marvel Studio has tapped David Maisel as studio chairman, with Kevin
Feige becoming the top creative executive as president and chief
operating officer Michael Helfant departs, Variety reported. Maisel,
who had been vice chairman, continues to occupy the office of the
chief executive for Marvel Entertainment with Isaac Perlmutter and
John Turitzin. Feige continues as production president and will more
directly supervise creative aspects of Marvel's TV, home-video and
video-game efforts. Feige also is a producer on the upcoming releases
Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk. The moves mark the official end of
an era for former chief Avi Arad, who had stayed on as a creative
adviser after he left last spring. He is now a full-fledged producer
and was not named in the company's release. The studio goes into
production this week on Iron Man, the Jon Favreau-directed superhero
movie that's set for release in 2008. Hulk is also set for a 2008
release.

TERRA
According to Variety, Luke Wilson, Amanda Peet, Dennis Quaid, Justin
Long and Chris Evans have signed to provide voices for Snoot
Entertainment's upcoming computer- animated SF film TERRA, about the
interplanetary conflict between the inhabitants of a peaceful world
and the human warriors who want to colonize it.

MORE FUTURAMA
Matt Groening, creator of THE SIMPSONS, told IFmagazine.com that Fox
will produce four direct-to-DVD movies of his Futurama show, with the
first, Futurama: Bender's Big Score, due for release in December. The
films will then be carved up into 16 episodes of the SF animated
series, to begin appearing on Comedy Central starting in 2008. "We're
doing four DVD movies, around 90 minutes [each], and then we're going
to reconfigure those, and they'll be episodes on Comedy Central,"
Groening told the site. "The impolite way of saying it is we're
chopping them up, and the polite way is to say we're reconfiguring,
and we're going to add narration and more stuff. We're going to be
doing some fun extras on the DVD show. There's going to be Everybody
Loves Hypno-Toad, a whole show of it. The DVDs are going to be self-
contained packages, but the episodes will also work, we hope. That's
the goal."

LIFE ON MARS
ABC has decided to delay its pilot "Life on Mars," hoping a later
start will give the project a better pick for its lead role. The
network and producer David E. Kelley were having trouble finding the
right actor to play the lead role, the showbiz trade papers report,
and so decided to push the pilot, an adaptation of a BBC series, back
to midseason 2007-08. Doing so will allow Kelley and Co. to pick from
a bigger pool of actors than are currently available in the crush of
pilot casting. "Life on Mars" centers on a present-day detective who
finds himself transported back to the early 1970s, when policing
relied on brute force more than careful analysis of evidence. Though
he's stuck in the past, he uncovers clues that may help solve the
abduction of his girlfriend in the present day -- provided he can get
back there. The British show, which stars John Simm ("State of
Play"), debuted last year and is currently in the middle of its
second season on the BBC. The first season aired on BBC America last
summer. Rachelle Lefevre ("What About Brian") is thus far the only
actor cast in the ABC version. She is set to play the lone female
detective in the '70s-era department.

HEROES - SPOILER WARNING
Everyone is gearing up for the final five episodes of HEROES, to
begin airing April 23. In a panel discussion for the Museum of
Television and Radio's William S. Paley Festival in Hollywood,creator
Tim Kring said that the show will eventually bring all of the main
hero characters together before the season is out and offered a
preview of the April 23 episode, in which many secrets are revealed
about Mr. Linderman (Malcolm McDowell). Kring unveiled a long scene
from the next new episode, ".07," featuring McDowell's Linderman
speaking with Adrian Pasdar's Nathan Petrelli (spoilers ahead!).
Among other things, viewers learn that Linderman has super powers of
his own, that he was once a member of a group of heroes, that the
members of the group eventually used their powers for personal gain—
and that he is behind the plot to blow up New York as a way to
engender widespread fear, which he believes will bring the nation
together in hope. Linderman also reveals a prophecy that Nathan will
eventually wind up in the White House. As for the season finale,
Kring told fans that he was "still putting the final script
together," but has it all mapped out. "I know everyone's fate," he
said cryptically. Greg Grunberg, who plays psychic cop Matt Parkman,
said that he had already read the script for the 22nd of 23 episodes
and that it "just blew me away." Who lives and who dies? "It's the
nature of the show to know that we're all vulnerable," Grunberg
added. Kring and Grunberg were joined on the panel by cast members
Santiago Cabrera (Isaac Mendez), Sendhil Ramamurthy (Mohinder
Suresh), Jack Coleman (H.R.G.), Hayden Panettiere (Claire Bennet),
Masi Oka (Hiro Nakamura), Milo Ventimiglia (Peter Petrelli), Pasdar,
Ali Larter (Niki Sanders), Noah Gray-Cabey (Micah Sanders) and
Leonard Roberts (D.L. Hawkins). Heroes airs Mondays at 9 p.m. ET/PT.

I guess that is about it for this week. I hope you have a terrific
weekend ahead. Be sure to stop over to the website
(http://www.isnnews.net) when you can for whatever is new in the
world of science fiction. Tell your friends about it as well and
encourage them to join in the discussion topic this week.

Be safe.
Sandy

Sandra Bruckner
Editor/Publisher
ISN News: The Zocalo Today
http://www.isnnews.net