TV and Movie News

Joan of Arcadia continues on a strong season, with three great episodes back to back. If you're not watching this show, you should be. Joan has enough problems of her own, with moving to a new town and her brother's recent accident, which left him paralyzed from the waist down. But now, some strange guy is following her around, insisting he is God. And he knows a little bit too much about her.

Fox Primetime: Just a reminder, Fox has yet to premier any of its new shows for the season as they will follow the World Series. They teased 24 Season 3 last night during the ball game - it starts October 28th. Get your TIVOs ready!

Buffy related News: Sounds like Alyson Hannigan (Willow) is signing with NBC for a show. Check out this post for that news and information on where all the Buffy writers have gone.

Enterprise continues its downward spiral, forcing me to get out my old Voyager tapes to watch some good Star Trek. This show needs a SERIOUS overhall or it will be cancelled.

Speaking of Voyager, my sources tell me that the DVDs will start up in May of 2004. Get ready!

Kill Bill Volume 1 should be titled "Pointless Act of Violence." I showered after getting home from this flick - at several points, I saw other members of the audience flinching or turning away from the relentless, pointless violence being depicted on the screen before us. When I bought my ticket, they asked for ID - a first for me - and I asked about how the film was doing. The ticket dude sort of shrugged, and based on how many people were in the theater, I don't know how this is the number 1 film of the week. SPOILERS: Don't read this if you want to be surprised by the buckets of gore and blood that will be thrown at you as if you were the victim of some unfortunate college prank. Cartoonish and action-packed, this will leave you feeling ultimately disappointed. See an alternate review here. Tarantino, one of my favorite directors, disappoints with this homage to blood. At one point, the film cuts to black and white to spare the unfortunate viewer from the truly amazing amounts of blood, limbs, and decapitations that occur -- the ticket dude said that they had to make that portion of the film (Uma Thurman vs. 120 sword-wielding assassins) black and white to avoid an NC-17 rating. Bottom Line: Not worth your time, but I'll see part two to see how it ends. Not as good at Reservoir Dogs, falls FAR short of Pulp Fiction.

LOTR: Return of the King. The producers swear that it will be ready in time for December, but dropped a hint that ADDITIONAL FILMING WILL BE REQUIRED next year to complete the ROTK Extended Edition, due sometime late next year. Interesting, huh?

Pirates of the Carribean 2 sounds like it is on track - everyone is just waiting on a script. No word on when they'll start filming, but Gore Verbinski, director of the first outing, has signed to direct the followup. It appears as if all the major players (except villain Geoffrey Rush) are returning for the second sailing, including stars Johnny Depp, Kiera Knightly, Orlando Bloom and producer Jerry Bruckheimer.