Get your agent on the phone…Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant’s Extras, their six-episode follow-up to The Office, gets picked up by HBO for broadcast Stateside. And there was much rejoicing (at least in these parts.)
Category: Television
Nearscape.
Buffy and Angel fans, look to the stars: The trailer for Joss Whedon’s Serenity breaks online. I never watched the TV show, so I don’t really know what’s going on here, but I could see myself catching this, if for nothing else than for Chiwetel Ejiofor as the villain. Still, that “define interesting” exchange near the end, among others in this clip, just about sets my teeth on edge.
Adad Dada.
Slate‘s Seth Stevenson laments the rise of absurdity-for-its-own-sake in television commercials. I dunno…I still tend to crack up every time that Salt-n-Pepa Nextel ad comes on.
Dead Men Tell Some Tales.
Can’t tell a hooplehead from a squarehead? What are you, from Yankton? Well, this establishment here can at least help you separate fact from fiction on HBO’s Deadwood. Some spoilers to be had, if the writers keep following the basic history of the town. (Courtesy of the formidable proprietors of Triptych Cryptic.)
Liquid Cinema.
The web site for the live action Aeon Flux, starring Charlize Theron and Francis McDormand, goes live with a short intro and flash images of some of the main characters. While this doesn’t seem like a must-see by any means, it might make for a decent B-movie, I guess. I’ve yet to figure out how they’re going to capture the feel of the cartoon, tho’.
Kenny’s with the Angels.
“In 22 minutes, Trey Parker and Matt Stone manage to hammer politicians, the media, religious hypocrisy and every other aspect of the madness that is the Schiavo case. How they were able to put this together so quickly is astounding — it’s more timely than ‘The Daily Show.'” Salon‘s Andrew Leonard sings the praises of the most recent South Park.
Doctor Who?
At first I thought this might be an April Fools joke…but, no, it seems that Christopher Eccleston has already tired of Doctor Who after 13 episodes and will be replaced for the recently-announced second season. Phew, thank goodness for Gallifreyan regeneration.
Renovating Southfork.
“You suck! Dallas rules!” It’s Bill Haverchuck‘s dream come true — Apparently, marketing geniuses are putting together a feature film version of Dallas, with Catherine Zeta-Jones as Pamela Ewing and — possibly — Brad Pitt as Bobby. Hmmm. If this goes ahead, I’ll bet dollars-to-donuts Billy Bob Thornton ends up being J.R.
Vox Populi.
“I’d recognize The Dude’s friendly growl anywhere. But almost no one else will…Why would Duracell pay big bucks for the voice of a Hollywood star?” In a world of commercial voices both gruff and soothing, Slate‘s Seth Stevenson delves into current trends in the voice-over industry.
Send in the Clones.
In case you missed them on the Cartoon Network, all twenty-five episodes of Genndy Tartakovsky’s Clone Wars are now available online. Season 2 in particular, involving General Grievous’ invasion of Coruscant, apparently leads right into Episode III…and they’re at least as entertaining as Attack of the Clones.