Who can’t wait to watch ‘Watchmen’? (~raises hand~)

by Therese Odell, posted in Uncategorized

 

New York Comic Con was this weekend, and a ton of news and trailers were dumped on us as a result. Being a huge fan of Damon Lindelof, I’m most interested in Watchmen, so that’s what we are going to lead with today. It’s my blog, I do what I want.

 

At NYCC, the first episode of Watchmen was screened for a crowd of about 2,000, and the reactions have been something else:

And apparently, when the cast and Lindelof, the director and original The Watchmen comic artist, Dave Gibbons came out for a panel following the screening, they were met with a standing ovation. While Alan Moore, the author of The Watchmen wants nothing to do with the series, and has asked everyone to keep his name out their mouths, Gibbons, at least, approves: “’I first met Damon at San Diego Comic Con in 2018 and he talked and talked,’ Gibbons said, ribbing uber-fan Lindelof. ‘And I did discover he had a huge respect for what [Watchmen co-creator Alan Moore] and I had done and the conclusion was, I thought if anyone was going to do a TV series with it, it’s him, and from what I’ve seen so far, it’s not far off the mark.’”

As for how Regina King came to the project, Lindelof regards her the same way I do: as the best actress working today, and he sent the script directly to her home (rather than through agents) with a note explaining how dear this project is to him, and how he didn’t want anyone else on it. It clearly worked. Also, and this is interesting for any Lost or The Leftovers fans, Lindelof has a rule where he won’t work with an actor twice — a rule he broke for King.

Also fascintating: Watchmen is set in Tulsa and the raid of Black Wall Street in 1921 strongly informed the project. Turns out King was working on her own project about the Tulsa massacre when Lindelof approached her. Lindelof talks a lot about being a white guy taking on this issue in this very good interview and assures the interviewer that of the 12 writers on the show, only 4 were white guys, which in and of itself is remarkable.

Disappointingly, however, he also reveals that he envisions the series as only one season long — only these 9 episodes. BOO. Here are a bunch of other things to know about the series which I am definitely going to recap.

The other huge news from NYCC is that Lauren Cohan is, in fact, returning to The Walking Dead (just like everyone knew she would) for it’s 11th season, which has officially been announced. Also, ninjas.

Angel had a reunion at NYCC in honor of its 20th anniversary (Jesus, I am SO OLD) and here’s a reminder that the female characters on that show were treated like garbage. Charisma Carpenter addressed her own feelings about Cordelia’s end, and in short: she wasn’t happy about it.

Apparently, they DID discuss having the passengers of Flight 828 learn that Trump was president, but they chose not to include it in the episode because they wanted to make me lose my damn mind. THANKS AGAIN, MANIFEST, YOU WERE THE BEST.

In an interview, George R.R. Martin has written that the show was not “completely faithful” to his ending. O REALLY? WHICH PARTS, GEORGE? HOW ABOUT YOU FINISH WRITING THE BOOKS SO WE CAN FIND OUT, BUDDY.

Please don’t shoot reporters, y’all.

I don’t watch The Masked Singer (and am well-aware I am the only person in America who does not) but Black Widow is clearly someone from The Real Housewives of Atlanta, right?

I’m sorry, what does Tyler Cameron do for a living?

I, for one, am thrilled that Michael Knight is on General Hospital and would very much like for him to stick around.

HGTV’s Tarek El Moussa and Christina Anstead are hucksters, you guys.

In the chaos tornado that is life now, I forgot to mention this story from last week: that Disney networks, including ABC, will no longer run Netflix ads. HUH.

Impeachment Corner!

What a weekend, amirite? Again, before I go down today’s road of crazy, remember, this is all very simple: President Dipshit called a foreign government and threatened to withhold necessary military aid unless and until they agreed to investigate his political rival for corruption ahead of an election. Everything else I’m going to tell you here is interesting and adds layers, but at root, we have the President of the United States using his power to try to smear a political rival with the help of a foreign government.

The biggest news over the last couple of days is that a second whistleblower has come forward claiming to have FIRST-HAND knowledge of the Ukraine call, they’ve lawyered up and have spoken to the inspector general. What’s important about this is that a whistleblower with first-hand knowledge of the call would completely blow out of the water this bullshit GOP talking point that the original whistleblower doesn’t have credibility because their knowledge was second-hand. Of course, everything in their report has been proven true by the transcript and by the White House, but whatever. The point is this second whistleblower has some shit to say, and it’s going to be harder to claim we can’t take them seriously.

But! Not only that! The lawyer who is representing both whistleblowers is now saying that he’s representing MULTIPLE potential whistleblowers:

modern family happy shimmy cameron gloria

Also, the CIA’s lead lawyer made a criminal referral to the Department of Justice about the original whistleblower report, and the DOJ, they did bupkiss with it because Bill Barr is up to his waddles in this mess.

And hey! Remember how Rick Perry is somehow HILARIOUSLY in the center of all this crap because he went to the Ukrainian president’s inauguration in Mike Pence’s stead and also met with the guy a few times? Yeah, President I Did Nothing Wrong, he told Congressional Republicans that Rick Perry made him make the call, saying something to the effect of: “Not a lot of people know this but, I didn’t even want to make the call. The only reason I made the call was because Rick asked me to. Something about an LNG [liquefied natural gas] plant.”

Now, here’s where it gets interesting and DIRTY. In addition to wanting the Ukrainians to investigate Joe Biden and his son, there’s a group of businessmen and GOP donors with ties to Giuliani and Perry who had plans to replace the board of directors on the gas company that Biden’s son is on with their own people to steer contracts in their direction. And guess who has been pressing President Zelenskiy to fire members of the gas company’s advisory board? Because if you guessed Rick Perry, you’d be exactly right. And 1. Perry’s not even denying it and 2. claiming he’s not resigning after all:

Meanwhile, Congress has demanded documents from Mike Pence and subpoenaed the Pentagon, and the Office of Management and Budget. Gordon “Call Me” Sondland is scheduled to testify before Congress this week, as is the career diplomat Masha Yovanovitch, who was yoinked from her post in Ukraine because she was getting in the way of Giuliani and his plans, which he as much admitted because Rudy Giuliani.

Oh! And this has nothing to do with impeachment, but President Corrupted has announced he’s pulling our troops out of Syria and allowing Turkey to invade, putting our Kurdish allies in extreme peril of being genocided by the Turks. I’m not going to go into a whole thing about why this is HORRIFIC, but suffice it to say when Lindsey Graham, Brian Kilmeade and I are all clutching our pearls over the same thing for the same reason, it’s bad.

Obviously, President Great and Unmatched Wisdom is handling the criticism (which is coming from all corners) really well:

And in more hilarious news, a federal judge ruled that Trump’s tax returns have to be handed over to the Manhattan D.A. Now, a temporary stay has been ordered by an appellate court, but we getting closer, guys. I sure would be interested to learn, say, how much he makes from his tower in Istanbul.

mmhmm-zing-snap-rupaul-drag-race

Also, this happened.

dustin stranger things i love you

Renewals

  • Prodigal Son is the first new series of the fall to be renewed.

Cancellations

In Development

  • The Vault, a postapocalyptic drama, is being developed at NBC.
  • Repeat, a time travel drama, is in the works at CBS.
  • Behind the Attraction, a docuseries about Disney attractions, is coming to Disney+.
  • True Viking a competition series from Tormund (Kristofer Hivju) is in the works.
  • Peter Morgan has signed an overall deal with Netflix.

Casting News

Mark Your Calendar

  • Supernatural returns on The CW on Thursday.
  • The new Walking Dead series will debut sometime in 2020.
  • Star Trek: Picard will debut on CBS All Access on January 23.
  • Star Trek: Discovery will return on CBS All Access on ???
  • Manifest returns on NBC in spring 2020.
  • The Little Mermaid Live will air on ABC on November 5.
  • Rick & Morty returns on Adult Swim on November 10.
  • Lost in Space returns on Netflix on December 24.
  • Marvel’s Runaways returns on Hulu on December 13.
  • The Expanse returns on Amazon on December 13.
  • Outlander returns on Starz on February 16.
  • Snowpiercer will debut on TNT on ???
  • Devs is coming soon to Netflix.
  • Riverdale returns on The CW on Wednesday.
  • She-Ra returns on Netflix on November 5.

R.I.P.

Rip Taylor, Glitter-loving flamboyant comedian and actor

Lewis Dauber, Character actor

Cassandra Waldon, Big Brother contestant from the first season

Ginger Baker, Drummer in the band Cream

WATCH THIS

All American: Spencer James’ reputation is on the line in the season premiere. 7 p.m., The CW

Black Lighting: Agent Odell continues to come after the Pierce family (wait! there’s a bad guy named “Odell”? APPROVE STRONGLY) in the season premiere. 8 p.m., The CW

Below Deck: Six new crew members are introduced as Captain Lee’s ship heads to Thailand. Season premiere. 8 p.m., Bravo

My Horror Story: People tell their ghost stories. You’ve seen this before. Series premiere. 9 p.m., Travel

ASTROS!: Astros at Rays 12 p.m., MLBN (Other games: Braves at Cardinals 2 p.m., TBS; Dodgers at Nationals: 5:40 p.m., TBS; Yankees at Twins: 7:40 p.m., FS1)

Late Night:

  • Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon: Lupita Nyong’o, Dane Cook, Jay “Sinatraa” Won, Matthew “Super” DeLisi, the Avett Brothers
  • Late Night with Seth Meyers: David Harbour, Ryan Eggold, Lauren Daigle, Steve Gorman
  • The Late Show with Stephen Colbert: Neil deGrasse Tyson, Susan Rice
  • The Late Late Show with James Corden: Ben Platt, Zoey Deutch
  • Jimmy Kimmel Live: Charlize Theron, Forest Whitaker, Black Pumas
  • The Daily Show: Chanel Miller
  • Lights Out with David Spade: Rob Corddry, Candice Thompson, Chris Franjola
  • Watch What Happens Live: Mark Consuelos, Heidi Gardner
  • A Little Late with Lily Singh: Katy Mixon, Titus Burgess

 

MON. 7:00 7:30 8:00 8:30 9:00 9:30
ABC Dancing with the Stars
(new)		 The Good Doctor
(new)
CBS The Neighborhood
(new)		 Bob Hearts Abishola
(new)		 All Rise
(new)		 Bull
(new)
CW All American
(new)		 Black Lightning
(new)		 Local
FOX 9-1-1
(new)		 Prodigal Son
(new)		 News/Local
NBC The Voice
(new)		 Bluff City Law
(new)

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