Hailing Frequencies Issue #318

If you want to be notified when this newsletter is updated, email me to be put on my "notification" list.

It's official. After fooling around in the rumors stage for quite a while, the new primetime Aquaman show has been announced for the WB, done by the Smallville people, but not staring Alan Ritchson, who played the guy who talks to fish on Smallville last month. Al Gough and Miles Millar (Spider-Man 2) will create and executive-produce the pilot, to be directed by Greg Beeman. As with Smallville, the name of the show won't be the name of the superhero. My vote? The Guy Who Talks to Fish.

Whee! SCI FI Channel has renewed its original series Battlestar Galatica for a third season. Production on the next round of 20 episodes should begin in Vancouver in February 2006 for premiere later in the year. The series entire ensemble cast and production crew returns for the new season. Rumor has it that the third season will kick off with some sort of major changes in the command structure.

Well, Dr. Who enjoyed a tempest in a teapot this week, as Daily Mirror reported that Billie Piper quit her role as Rose Tyler to avoid becoming typecast (the reason given, if you'll recall for the loss of the actor who played the Doctor the first season, Christopher Eccleston). However, Piper herself called the who thing "rubbish," as reported by ITN. A BBC spokesperson has stated that "Rose has a whole new journey and a fantastic set of adventures to go on with the brand new Doctor, starting in the special on Christmas Day."

Out: PAC-Man World 3 from Namco Hometek for the PlayStation 2, Xbox, GameCube and PC (Nintendo DS and PSP in December). The evil genius Erwin has created a machine that can penetrate into the Spectral Realm, the world of the Ghosts, and ultimately devastate the world.

Coming Soon North America: Dragon Quest VIII—Journey of the Cursed King from Square Enix for the PlayStation 2. Updates include voice-overs, a full-orchestral soundtrack, a renovated menu system, new battle abilities and improved animations. The game will include a bonus disc with a playable demo of the North American version of Final Fantasy XII.

Coming March 2006: Drakengard from Ubisoftand Square Enix for the PlayStation2 based on the Japanese hit. Adventure game with knights and dragons.

The soundtrack to Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, with a score by Patrick Doyle, is out too.

Ubisoft and Universal Studios Consumer Products Group are doing the King Kong videogame and have the voices and likenesses of Naomi Watts, Adrien Brody, and Jack Black in the game. The game is rated "T" for Teen and ships on Tuesday the 22nd for the major platforms.

Spoilers Alert! TV Guide's AskAusiello has posted an exclusive Q&A with executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse. Here are some of the not-so-spoilerish bits:

Why was Shannon marked for death?
Damon: It was by no means a result of Maggie's abilities as an actress, which, we felt were gaining ground every time we saw her on the screen. But Shannon is a 22- or 23-year-old character, and the flashback stories and limitations in terms of her life experience…. The younger the character is on the show, the more limited you are in terms of stories you can tell. So, before we started running Shannon into the ground and doing the same stories over and over again, it felt like it was a very natural time to kill [her] off. And the idea that was appealing to us, and certainly to Maggie, was that we would finally show Shannon in this different light. Make her incredibly sympathetic and then she would die.

Can you confirm that Shannon was, in fact, shot? Fans have been speculating that she looked like she had a stab wound.
Carlton: She was shot.
Damon: People are getting a little too…

They're reaching a little too much?
Carlton: They totally are. And she did not have a Dharma Initiative stamp on her.

On Nov. 30 we'll finally learn what Kate's precrash crime was that landed her in so much hot water. Any other big flashback revelations this season?
Damon: In the next string of episodes, one of the really compelling backstory elements is what happened to Jack's marriage. We think Julie Bowen is amazing and she and Matthew Fox are so great in scenes together, and I think the audience is really curious as to what went wrong there.
Carlton: And you should pay attention to Mr. Eko's stick.

Seriously?
Carlton: Yeah.
Damon: Keep your eyes on Mr. Eko's stick.
Carlton: That stick is an important ongoing clue.

The Nov. 30 episode is entitled "What Kate Did." Hopefully, the explanation will include what the deal is with the toy plane.

Check out The Official Lost Fan Club, which allows you to pay $27.95 for a club DVD, a T-shirt, cast photos, trading cards, posters, bumper stickers, an Oceanic Airlines carry bag, a frequent-flyer card, a boarding pass to Flight 815, and a password for the news and spoilers stuff on the site itself.

ABC is producing the "Lost Video Diaries" with extra stuff about the show (though not enough to actually figure anything out before the rest of the world about what's going on on that island) for mobile phones with "a major U.S. carrier."

The show's livening up its November offerings by bringing back the dead. Rod Serling is digitally resurrected for the Nov. 21 3D episode "Still Life," spliced from old Twilight Zone footage with voicework by Mark Silverman (the only Serling voice actor recognized by the Serling estate). Basically, it will be Serling's job to tell the audience when to put on their red-and-blue glasses, provided by this week's TV Guide. Yeesh. It just all seems so complicated.

Title: The Psycho
Origin: Comic book
Screenwriter: Chris Morgan (from Dan Bereton and James Hudnall)
Studio: Universal
Premise: People get superpowers from a dangerous drug. Rogue CIA agent takes the drug to rescue his girlfriend and expose political curruption. The Bush Administration could not be reached for comment.
Production Date: Unknown

Title: Foreverman
Origin: New
Screenwriter: Stan Lee and Peter Briggs
Studio: Paramount
Premise: Everyman crimefighter with issues.
Production Date: 2007

Title: Journey 3-D
Origin: Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth
Screenwriter: D.V. DeVincentis
Director: Eric Brevig
Studio: Walden Media and New Line
Premise: Scientist and teenage son find the land that time forgot. Shot live against blue screen.
Production Date: April 2006

Title: The Mutant Chronicles
Origin: SF RPG
Screenwriter: Simon Hunter and Ross Jameson
Director: Simon Hunter
Studio: Ed Pressman's Pressman & Co. Films
Premise: Marine leads a squad of soldiers against the alien hordes of the 24th Century on a ravaged planet.
Production Date: Spring 2006

Title: White Noise 2: The Light
Origin: Sequel
Screenwriter: Matt Venne
Studio: Gold Circle Films
Premise: Man whose family is murdered recovers to find he can ID people who are about to die.
Production Date: Spring 2006

Title: The 8th Voyage of Sinbad
Origin: 1001 Arabian Nights
Screenwriter: Charlie Mitchell
Starring: Keanu Reeves
Studio: Sony Pictures
Premise: Quest for the Lamp of Aladdin
Nixed: No faith from studio in wake of Stealth flop

It's dead and it ain't comin' back. ABC has canceled Night Stalker, effective immediately, leaving three unaired episodes, including the original pilot. Exec producer Frank Spotnitz blogs, "While I'm disappointed the series has come to an end, I am enormously grateful for the experience and the opportunity given me by the network and Touchstone Television."

Brannon Braga told SCI FI Wire "There will be a lot of fans cheering" at the news that he's "done" with Star Trek. Though what he really means is, "Just having come off so many years on the show and having done something different, I just don't think I would be ready now. Nor do I think they would necessarily ask me." Braga has written more than 150 episodes for Star Trek and cowroteGenerations and First Contact. Braga's keeping busy these days with Threshold. (see below)

Ron Moore's SCI FI Blog has a nicely detailed tribute to his experiences working with the late Michael Piller. Here's a sample:

Launching James Doohan's remains into space will have to wait a bit, pending more rocket engine tests.

TV Shows on DVD reports the unconfirmed news that Paramount will be releasing Star Trek: The Animated Series on DVD.

Industrial Light & Magic will receive the 2004 National Medal of Technology, America's highest honor for innovation. Congrats!

Bryan Singer told SCI FI Wire that he used "a combination of unused footage, [used] footage and recreated footage [for Superman's father]. You won't necessarily see Marlon Brando walking around or reanimated in a conventional sense, but you will hear [dialogue] that you have heard before [and] takes that you haven't heard before and a rendering that is completely new....I got ahold of Brando's London [automated dialogue replacement, or looping,] session.

Look for the teaser trailer with select screenings of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, or just go see it here at the SCI FI Wire's Trailers page.

Singer also told SCI FI Wire that Jack Larson (Jimmy Olsen in the 1950s TV show) and Noel Neill (Lois Lane in the 1948 serial and the TV show) are doing cameos, though, "Unfortunately they weren't together. They worked at two separate points. But it was great to have them down here. It really inspires everyone to have people from that period here and to hear them tell stories. It was great."

Braga told SCI FI Wire: "In an upcoming episode one of the regulars will completely come unraveled, and it's going to be one of the three: Molly [Carla Gugino], Cavennaugh [Brian Van Holt] and Lucas [Robert Patrick Benedict], who were exposed to that videotape...One of them is going to become unraveled, and one of them is going to turn."

Threshold returns November 22 at 10 PM. Braga has high hopes that the new timeslot will translate into higher ratings.

Bryan Singer told SCI FI Wire: "I love the X-Men universe....I love the cast. And I love the people I worked with. Fortunately I'm still friends with most all of them. In fact, I wanted to go visit them [during the X-Men 3 shoot]. I wanted to go visit them on a trip back [from shooting Superman Returns in Australia], but I didn't have a chance. They're all great people, and Brett's an old friend....Of course I miss it. Extremely. But I will also say that what takes an audience several hours to watch in a theater takes six years of my life. To be able to do something different is very satisfying as well. So all is not lost, so to speak."

XMenFillms says that "two models have signed a deal" to be in X-Men 3 or another X-Men movie. Mercedes Scelba-Shorte "will play a mutant simply known as M." Ashley Hartman is to play Emma Frost.

Last week's fake news story: Danny Elfman has been tagged to score WB's upcoming CGI feature film Tiny, a toy version of the Titanic that runs into trouble of its own. (I totally ripped this off a cartoon by Robert Smigel.)

This Week's Question: Where else besides Archer's quarters do we see pictures of the previous Enterprises?

Send your answer to scifi@about.com. All correctly answering trivia maniacs will have their names mentioned in the next letter. The first winner gets to make a request, anything they like -- within reason -- for the next "Hailing Frequencies" Issue. Please let me know if you don't want me to post your email address if you win.

Last Week's Question: Finish this quote: ""I do not want to spend my honeymoon climbing, hiking, sweating, bleeding or..."

Send in your best caption for the picture below. The best (as in, my favorite) entry will appear in next week's issue.

THIS WEEK'S WINNER:

"Increasingly discouraged by his dismal sex life, SpongeBob decided to dispense with subtlety." - Chris

Honorable Mentions..

"Life in the Q-ube Continium" - Debra Smith

"In this insider's scoop from the set of the hit TV show Invasion we finally get to see what is hiding in the everglades." - RJ

TV Network Executive Driving By: "What the heck do we name our new copycat cartoon series? Wait... I know! Cardboardbox-Bob Squarish Pants!" - Greg

"Ohhhh...who lives in a split-level out in burbs?" - Michael

"Hi, I live in Julia's neighborhood, and I have waaaaay too much time on my hands." - BTCHONWHLS

"Hi, MTV! This is my crib." - Alex

"Drive-by on Socially Aware & Subversive Cartoon Street" - Ramond

This week's topic: You know what we haven't gotten remade lately? Those giant something-or-other films that terrorize towns and teenagers. Do you think there's a market out there for a resurgence of these?

Simply put, I would define speculative fiction as fiction about what could have been or what could be. It can be set in anywhere in the past present, or future, and sometimes the setting itself is speculative (like Middle Earth or Coruscant). Sometimes what is called "fantasy" deals with science, and all speculative fiction is some type of fantasy (by the academic definition of the word). The term "speculative fiction" is just another way of saying "fantasy" without people thinking you're talking about dragons and elves specifically. Well, that's my take on it.

Send me something if you've got something to say. It can be about anything that's on your mind! (Please let me know if you don't want your email address to accompany your name in either contest or for the LTE.)

1 Chicken Little...........................$83,446,279
2 Derailed...................................$14,607,080
3 Jarhead...................................$48,852,860
4 Get Rich or Die Tryin'..................$19,642,722
5 Saw II.....................................$75,474,923
6 Zathura...................................$14,785,480
7 The Legend of Zorro..................$40,198,746
8 Prime......................................$19,613,230
9 Pride and Prejudice......................$3,580,000
10 Good Night and Good Luck.........$15,006,024

1.Medium 8.7
2. Ghost Whisperer 7.6
3. Invasion 6.0
4. Lost 5.9
5. Surface 5.9
6. Alias 4.5
7. Threshold 4.1
8. Smallville 3.5
9. Night Stalker 3.3

1. Alias 2.2
2. Smallville 1.6
3. Stargate Atlantis 1.5
4. Stargate SG-1 1.4
5. Star Trek: Enterprise 1.3
6. Farscape 1.0
7. The Outer Limits 1.0
8. The Twilight Zone 0.9
9. Sabrina 0.7

1. A Feast for Crows (Ice and Fire 4)
2. Narnia box set
3. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
4. The Complete Calvin and Hobbes
5. The Penultimate Peril (Lemony Snicket 12)
6. Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt
7. Knife of Dreams (Wheel of Time 11)
8. Eldest (Inheritance 2)
9. The Da Vinci Code
10. Wicked

1. Star Wars: Episode III
2. Madagascar
3. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
4. Lost season one
5. The Polar Express
6. Cinderella platinum edition
7. Batman Begins
8. Firefly complete series
9. War of the Worlds