Matthew Kadish's Blog: Matthew Kadish's Evil Hive Mind Blog, page 7

Josh Brolin To Play THANOS In Marvel Cinematic Universe

There’s some cool news from the Marvel Movieverse today.  It seems they’ve finally cast an actor to play Thanos – the uber-big-bad of their shared cinematic universe.  Here’s the skinny via Latino Review:

There’s one major Marvel Character in Guardians of the Galaxy that hasn’t even been teased in any of the official trailers or stills, and that’s Thanos, the big bad guy of the Marvel films.

Thanos made his first appearance onscreen (played by Damion Poitier) at the end of The Avengers, giving an insidious smile when told that attacking Earth is courting death. Or “Death,” with a capital D, as the comic book Titan is in love with the physical embodiment of Death.

Thanos is a member of The Eternals, a group of god-like beings with immense power, far beyond that of humans. Thanos is referred to as the “Mad Titan” in the comics for attempting to wipe out the entire human race with his Infinity Gauntlet, capable of manipulating, time, space, reality and even the human soul.

We don’t know how big Thanos’ plan is, but we know from Thor: The Dark World that The Collector is collecting powerful mystical objects that most speculate will make up the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s version of the Infinity Gauntlet. If the Gauntlet is coming to screen, so is Thanos.

An article on James Gunn’s post-production process reported a scene with Thanos on a rocket throne in Act 3, which suggests an appearance long enough that someone is going to have to voice the Mad Titan, someone that could take the part into Avengers 3 as a major villain.

That meant Marvel was looking for an actor of some caliber, someone that could give a performance to a very complex, but very purple-skinned alien villain.

Our sources tell us that person is JOSH BROLIN!!

He’ll be providing the voice of Thanos in Guardians of the Galaxy and with a name and reputation like that, it’s likely he’ll join James Spader and Tom Hiddleston as actors who have tried to kill The Avengers.

Well, if you want an actor who can lend some gravitas to the role of your major bad guy, you could do a heck of a lot worse that Josh Brolin!  Aside from Ian McShane, who is the perfect voice for any bad guy ever made, I think Brolin is the perfect choice for the mad titan, and if this is true, it’s really inspired, especially considering how much Thanos is going to be built up as he begins appearing in other Marvel movies, leading up to his big role in Avengers 3.

Personally, I think its great that Marvel is taking the time to set up their big villain properly.  Having Thanos be the driving factor behind much of the mayhem in their movieverse before we get to see him take center stage is the perfect way to really build up the threat he poses.

What do you guys think?  Are you excited to know Brolin will be the one shaping the character from now on?

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Will Smith Walks Away From Brilliance

No, I’m not saying Will Smith is stupid.  I’m saying he’s officially left the movie adaptation of the sci-fi comic book Brilliance.  Here’s the skinny:

When Will Smith turned down the chance to reprise his role in Independence Day 2, it looked as if he’d opted to make a different science fiction movie instead. He’d been heavily linked with the movie take on Marcus Sakey’s book Brilliance, a mix of sci-fi and superheroes that tells of the small proportion of the population that have special gifts, and become known as ‘brilliants’.

Smith had been linked with the role of federal agent Nick Cooper in the film, whose talent is hunting down terrorists. And the project had also been linked with Noomi Rapace.

Now comes the news though that Brilliance, which already had a writer (David Koepp) and director (Julius Onan) in place won’t be featuring Will Smith after all. It’s being reported that Smith has now departed the project, although inevitably it’s unclear just how attached he was to it in the first place. That said, Deadline reports that scheduling problems have caused the parting of the ways.

After the disaster that was After Earth, I’m not really surprised if Smith might be a bit gun shy about doing another sci-fi film so soon.  Though, a single sci-fi flop doesn’t seem to phase Tom Cruse, who seems to be doing nothing but sci-fi anymore.  (Not that I’m complaining, mind you.)

I’ve never heard of the comic Brilliance before, but the idea that a guy’s superpower is hunting down terrorists is… well, frankly, it sounds lame.  Not that hunting down terrorists isn’t cool, but its not what I would call a superpower.  Now, having the ability to blow up terrorists with his brain – THAT is a superpower.  But the fact that he turned down both ID42 (aka Independence Day part Deux), and this film shows a disturbing anti-sci-fi trend with the Smithster.  Let’s hope it really is just a scheduling conflict and not him being turned off by the genre.

 

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BooKss101 Reviews Earthman Jack vs. The Ghost Planet

I’m always a fan of positive reviews of my work (my ego demands it), but I’m especially a fan of positive reviews in video form.  Booktuber Miranda over at the BooKss101 channel on YouTube just released her review of the first book in my Earthman Jack Space Saga series, Earthman Jack vs. The Ghost Planet, and she had some wonderful things to say about it.  She doesn’t take very long to get to the point about why she liked the book, so it’s worth watching in case you haven’t read it yet.  Also, the review is spoiler-free, so don’t be afraid to watch it if you just want to know WHY you should give it a read.  Thank you much for the review, Miranda!

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New Batman ‘Arkham Knight’ Trailer Is All Kinds Of Awesome

If you’re a Batman fan, then you’re probably a fan of the Arkham series of video games as well, since they are the closest thing one can get to actually being Batman.  I know I’ve enjoyed each game in the series a great deal.  Arkham Origins was handled by a different studio, but the originator of the franchise, Rocksteady, is back with the latest installment entitled Arkham Knight.  The official trailer appears to feature Scarecrow as the primary villain, as well as a whole new high-tech batsuit for Batman to wear, and some nifty batmobile hijinks.  Batman also looks like he’ll have his hands full with some very talented villains this time around.

What do you think of the trailer?  I simply cannot wait to play this game!

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Arrow Season 3 Secrets Revealed

WARNING: Spoilers for Season 2 and possible spoilers for Season 3 of Arrow. Avert your virgin eyes!

Well fellow Arrowheads, season two of CW’s DC Universe inspired superhero show Arrow has come and gone, and I’m happy to say it was yet another fantastic endeavor of action/adventure sci-fi comic-book-based melodrama. In a way, Arrow has proven to be the kind of show I’d always wished Smallville was. It takes itself seriously, has real things at stake for its characters, is mostly true to its DC characters, and doesn’t shy away from dark subject matter, all the while enforcing a message of hope and redemption.

I plan to go back and analyze season 2 more in-depth, but for now, let’s look forward and talk about season 3 of Arrow. I’m still buzzing from the wonderful season finale, and my mind is a-jumble with all the great stuff that’s been set-up for next season. So let’s break down what we know, and what we think will happen…

Oliver Ain’t Got No Job, And He Ain’t Got Sh*t To Do (Other Than Work Out)

Fighting Crime On No Money? How Does Spider-Man Do It???

One of the big twists of season 2 was Oliver losing control over Queen Consolidated through the subtle manipulation of Slade Wilson and Isabel Rochev (or, by just being a total moron. You decide). Oliver signs over his duties as CEO to Isabel when Slade kidnaps Thea so he can focus on saving his sister instead of worrying about CEOing. Isabel then uses her power as temporary CEO to enact a hostile take-over of Queen Industries and push the Queens out of their own company, seizing every one of their assets while she’s at it, including the Queen mansion and the Verdant nightclub.

The Arrow producers made it very clear that Oliver is going to be in a whole new situation in Season 3. He’s not going to have the money and resources he once did. That means he can’t afford to pay either Diggle or Felicity, nor can he get all types of fancy equipment for his crime-fighting endeavors. This means Olly will probably be doing more solo work and using down-and-dirty methods for his quest to save Starling City, and no doubt Roy will play a big role in that, as he’s used to living with nothing. This will probably be the big contributing factor to Roy and Olly’s growing, non-Thea-centric partnership.

Though I’m sure Felicity will probably continue to moonlight as Olly’s girl Friday, my guess is we’re going to see Diggle become more involved with ARGUS for various reasons, not the least of which is his wife, and his quest to avenge his brother’s death, which I have a feeling will play a bigger role in his character arc for season 3. And then, of course, we have the latest addition to Team Arrow – Laurel – who I’ll get to in a bit.

A Quest For Queen Consolidated

Dude, Where’s My Multi-Billion Dollar Company?

I believe we’re going to see a big sub-plot in the next season where Oliver strives to get his family’s company back once he realizes he can’t continue his quest for justice without the resources it provides him. He’ll no doubt enlist the help of his step-daddy Walter to come in and help clean up his mess, and this will more than likely lead to Walter assuming a Lucius Fox-type role at some point in the future. However, I theorize Oliver will get his family’s company back by the end of Season 3, metaphorically embracing his father’s legacy (which he shunned in Season 1 and reluctantly took up in Season 2), and giving him the resources he needs to bring his whole team back into the fold and defeat whatever big bad he’ll be facing in Season 3. I’m willing to bet we’ll see Oliver take a more serious role in getting his family’s business back, but he’ll most likely leave the CEO position to someone like Walter, who’s better suited for it, while Olly does his Vigilante thing.

There’s Going To Be A New Arrowcave

The New Arrowcave Promises To Be Much Harder To Find (And Ghetto)

The producers have confirmed we’ll be seeing some new sets in season 3. With Verdant now gone, the old Arrowcave is no longer the headquarters it once was (and let’s face it, people kept finding that place WAY too easily). So we’ll be seeing a lot more of Arrowcave Jr., which Oliver retreated to in self-pity in the episode “City of Blood” after his mother died. Arrowcave Jr. is a lot more secret and a lot less fancy, and apparently on property not owned by Queen Industries. We’ve also probably seen the last of Lex Luthor’s The Queen’s mansion. My guess is we may get a penthouse or something as Oliver’s home in the future.

Laurel Is Going To Play A Bigger Role In Team Arrow

Laurel Might Actually Be Interesting In Season 3.

For two seasons now, we’ve had to suffer through Laurel Lance doing… well, nothing really. Much like Lana Lang in Smallville, Laurel has pretty much served no other purpose than being “The Damsel In Distress” and totally annoying to watch when she’s not in some contrived type of danger. Her love-triangle between Tommy Merlyn and Olly was boring, and her downward spiral of alcoholism in season 2 was an even bigger waste of time for audiences. She was actually pretty interesting at the beginning of Season 2 where she was obsessed with capturing the Arrow when she blamed him for Tommy’s death, but that storyline quickly got shot to hell after she was fired from the DA’s office. And don’t get me started on the ridiculousness of how she got her job as a prosecutor back from the District Attorney.

Though it seems the Arrow writers have been struggling to figure out what to do with Laurel, now that she knows Olly’s alter-ego, that opens the door for a lot better use of her character. First of all, with the death of the head District Attorney during Streets of Fire, I’m betting we’re going to see Laurel running things over at the DA’s office, at least in a temporary capacity until another mayor can be elected. Then, of course, we have Laurel’s father, who is going to be out of commission after his injury from fighting one of Slade’s goons. Though it seemed as though Detective Lance may have “died” during the Season 2 finale, I’m guessing the Arrow writers take a page from Smallville’s book and just have him be in a coma or something that takes him out of commission for a while. This means that Laurel will be the only asset Oliver has in the Starling City justice system, and the two of them will be working together to target new threats to the city. We’ll also more than likely see her hire Felicity to work as her assistant in the DA’s office, just to make sure they can both still put food on the table while helping Olly fight crime.

In addition, I think we’ll start to see Laurel get more into the Vigilante swing of things as she starts to get trained to go on missions. No doubt, her propensity to find herself in dangerous situations will warrant Oliver training her to defend herself, which, coupled with her sister’s magical jacket of bad assness, will continue her journey toward becoming the real Black Canary. So I’m willing to bet Laurel will see more action in Season 3, and her alcoholism will be a thing of the past (possibly mentioned occasionally just so the writers can somewhat justify the ridiculous subplot in the first place).

We’ll probably start to get some real honest relationship-building between Olly and Laurel in season 3 as well, now that he doesn’t have to hide anything from her. But I’m willing to theorize there’s going to be some yummy love-triangle action between Laurel, Olly, and Felicity as a result.

Roy Harper Goes Full Sidekick

He’s Olly’s Mini-Me… In Red!

With Diggle going to work for ARGUS, we’re going to see Roy step up and assume Diggle’s role in the new “Team Broke Arrow.” Roy’s arc in Season 2 was all about him training to be a crime fighter, and though he no longer has his superpowers, the season finale showed that all that water bowl punching wasn’t for naught as he donned the red mask and began firing arrows at Slade’s Soldiers left and right. Season 3 will see more of Roy being trained and going on missions with Olly, and we’ll no doubt see some growing pains between the two as their partnership forms. But with Thea out of the picture, and Diggle off doing his Suicide Squad thing, Olly and Roy are going to be stuck together, which I’m sure will be full of “buddy cop” goodness, Lethal Weapon style, with Roy being the wild card and Olly being the grizzled veteran who doesn’t approve of his partner’s maniac hijinks.

Malcolm Merlyn Will Be Back In A Big Way

The Dark Archer Returns.

He was the big bad for the first season as “The Dark Archer” who was also the mastermind behind “The Undertaking,” which planned to destroy Starling City through the use of a nefarious earthquake machine that would level the entire Glades area of the city. (Apparently, Starling City’s “The Glades” is way worse than Florida’s! Trading in the crocodiles and humidity for mass murder.) It turns out Malcolm Merlyn went a bit kookie after his wife was mugged and killed in that troublesome part of town. So much so that he ran off and joined the League of Assassins, learned to kick all kinds of butt, and returned to pursue an unsuccessful career in supervalliany which ended with him getting stabbed in the freakin’ neck with an arrow. Oh, but not before he leveled half the city and inadvertently killed his only son.

Though we were led to believe Merlyn had been killed at the end of season 1, it was quickly revealed that it takes more than a sharp object to the jugular to keep a Dark Archer down. Merlyn pulled a Ra’s Al Ghul and somehow resurrected himself, returning to torment Moria Queen over the fact that Thea is actually his daughter, a lovechild born of a torrid affair between the two. Now that Tommy and his wife are dead, Thea is all Merlyn has left, and he wants to have her in his deliciously evil life.

Though Merlyn wasn’t seen much in Season 2, news of John Barrowman being a series regular for season 3 pretty much confirms Malcolm is going to be in a lot more episodes. Season 2 left Thea choosing to forsake her brother and her boyfriend in favor of her homicidal (as somehow still wealthy) long-lost-father. So here’s what’s going to happen with Thea and Merlyn in season 3…

First, we know that Ra’s Al Ghul is none too pleased with Merlyn and has League of Assassins members out hunting him. My guess is that we’re going to see some cross-over between Merlyn trying to train Thea to be a bad ass villain like him, along with Sara Lance and Nyssa on a mission to track down and kill Merlyn. Sara, seeing Merlyn’s influence on Thea, will try to reach out to her in an effort to get her away from Merlyn, but Merlyn will pull his “Daddy Mind Tricks” on Thea, who’ll choose to become a villain by the end of Season 3, setting up some pretty delectable conflict for Season 4 between her, Olly, and Roy (and possibly Laurel, more on this in a bit). I think the Arrow writers set this up nicely, what with Sara returning to the League at the end of Season 2 just so this type of thing could occur. (Plus, you know, she’s gonna need something to do to stay relevant in the show.)

H.I.V.E. Will Be Arrow Season 3’s Big Bad

Because Google Blocks All Searches For Secret Villainous Organizations.

The season 2 finale showed us that Oliver was taken off the island after his fight with Slade by ARGUS, which took him to Hong Kong where he supposedly was trained by them to be a bad ass… for some reason. The show already set up H.I.V.E. in the episode “Keep Your Enemies Closer” when Diggle discovered they were the ones who had hired Deadshot to kill his brother. My guess is that H.I.V.E. is going to be similar to HYDRA in Marvel’s universe, and that Oliver’s flashbacks of his time with ARGUS is going to dove-tail into Diggle’s employment with them as we see the machinations of H.I.V.E. begin to unfold. In fact, I’m going to go even further and postulate that H.I.V.E. has something to do with both Merlyn’s Undertaking and Slade Wilson’s quest for revenge. Just like ARGUS rescued Oliver from the Amazo, it wouldn’t surprise me to learn H.I.V.E. rescued Slade and gave him the resources he needed to go after Oliver. (This isn’t surprising since in the comics, the second incarnation of H.I.V.E. was started by Slade’s ex-wife Adeline Kane, who might have been using H.I.V.E. resources to try and track Slade down after he went missing on his mission to the island.)

This will also tie in Arrow Season 3 with The Flash Season 1 further than they already are, since in The New 52 universe of DC Comics, H.I.V.E. is responsible for the act that turned STAR Labs scientist Caitlin Snow into Killer Frost. And since Caitlin (played by Danielle Panabaker) has already appeared in Arrow and will be a series regular in The Flash, I’m betting H.I.V.E. might have been behind the malfunctioning of the STAR Labs particle accelerator in an effort to create metahumans they could control for their own nefarious purposes, the villains which are produced as a result being what The Flash series is going to be based around.

You know what this means, don’t you? It means that at some point, Oliver is going to have to go back to Slade to find out some crucial information concerning H.I.V.E. and how to defeat them, leading to some Hannibal Lecter-like tet-a-tet, Silence of the Lambs style. Eventually, I’m thinking Oliver may be forced to team up with Slade to take down H.I.V.E. by the end of the season, which of course will lead to Slade escaping so that he can cause more mischief for the Emerald Archer in season 4.

If I had to venture a guess, I’d go out on a limb and say the Arrow writers are going to have H.I.V.E. run by Vandal Savage, who will serve to be Olly’s central nemesis in Season 3. The writers have been very good about co-opting minor DC Villains and making them legit threats for Oliver to face in the show, and Vandal Savage has a history with H.I.V.E., as well as being quite a formidable, if rather unknown, villain in the DCU. For those unfamiliar with Savage, he is immortal and has plagued the earth with crime and violence since before the beginning of recorded human history. He is a brilliant tactician with immense technological prowess, and is one of DC’s most persistent villains and has fought hundreds of heroes throughout history – perfect for being the mastermind behind a shadowy global organization dedicated to destruction, like H.I.V.E. is. He also has ties to The Flash, which I’m sure will play into the first season of that show.

We may also see reference to Hector Hammond, since he also has some ties to H.I.V.E. in the comics, though I’m betting he will be more involved in The Flash series as a possible big bad. We’ve seen Ferris Air referenced in both Arrow and The Flash, which certainly ties Green Lantern into the larger Arrowverse. Knowing that the Arrow producers also produced the Green Lantern movie, and that if The Flash is a hit, they may spin off another show with a focus on the sci-fi aspect of the DCU, I don’t think it’s outside of the realm of possibility that we begin to see some cross-over with Green Lantern characters. After all, in the comics, Hal Jordan and Oliver Queen are good friends and teamed up for a time as their alter egos, so the Arrowverse has always been friendly with the Lanternverse. Using Hector Hammond as a primary Flash villain could pave the way for that spin-off to occur. But I feel the Vandal Savage big bad is a bit more likely, at least for now.

The Suicide Squad Lives

Aren’t They More Like The ‘Almost Die Constantly’ Squad?

We saw in the finale that Diggle employed the use of his Suicide Squad teammates to keep ARGUS from blowing Starling City to hell. A great deal of Season 2 was devoted to seeing the formation of the Suicide Squad, and I’m certain there are talks about spinning it off into its own series. Right now, it seems to consist of Diggle, his ex-wife and now baby momma Lyla, Deadshot, and Bronze Tiger. And with Helena now under lock and key, I’m willing to bet The Huntress is going to be added to the Suicide Squad roster in Season 3. What with Diggle not being employed by Oliver anymore, I think it’s reasonable to assume that while Olly is taking care of business in Starling City, Diggle will be globe-hopping with his merry band of miscreants as he works with ARGUS to uncover H.I.V.E.’s master plan and get revenge for his brother. We’ll no doubt get some interesting revelations from Dig’s missions, which I’m sure will connect with Oliver’s flashbacks somehow, and Dig and Oliver’s missions will converge by the end of the season bringing Green Arrow and Black Driver back together at long last. I’m also guessing we’ll see Anatoli return and possibly join the squad unofficially as KGBeast in some freelance capacity, because, you know, Anatoli is awesome.

More Formidable DC Villains Will Appear

Arrow’s Next Villain Shouldn’t Have Peripheral Vision As His Primary Weakness.

If there’s one thing Arrow does right, its bad guys, and they’ve done an excellent job of co-opting Batman’s more minor rogues gallery for the purposes of having legit villains for Oliver to struggle against. However, now that metahumans are a thing in the Arrowverse, the writers are now open to bringing in all manner of baddies for Oliver and Team Arrow to fight against. I’m betting we may see the return of a more zombified version of Cyrus Gold in season three, making him more like his Solomon Grundy alter ego from the comics. We’ll no doubt see more of China White as well, what with Olly’s flashbacks being Hong Kong-based and China White is involved in a triad. (The two just go together like chocolate and peanut butter people, I’m telling you.)(Plus, Kelly Hu is super hot in a white wig!)

Though I’m sure we won’t see any major Batman villains make an appearance because of FOX’s show Gotham, which focuses on the origins of Batman’s greatest foes, that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of bad guys that may appear to cause Olly grief. Here are some prime unknowns from Batman’s rogues gallery who may make an appearance as a villain of the week on Arrow:

Lady Vic – A sexy, British, hired assassin who’s descended from royalty.
Red Panzer – A self-styled anarchist recruited by H.I.V.E.
Siren – A villain able to hypnotize men into doing whatever she desires.
Cheshire – One of the deadliest assassins in the DC Universe, she is an expert in martial arts and the use of poisons.
Jericho – Slade Wilson’s son.
Copperhead – A snake-like master thief and sometimes assassin.
Calendar Man (Julian Day) – Known for committing crimes that correspond with significant dates or holidays.
Clayface (Or False-Face) – A criminal make-up artist and master of disguise who uses his skill to impersonate wealthy people.
Maxie Zeus – A former history teacher who loses his mind and starts committing crimes modeled after Greek mythology.
Ratcatcher (Otis Flannegan) – A one-time actual rat catcher who turns to a life of crime. He has the ability to communicate with and train rats and uses them to plague the city.
The Ventriloquist (Arnold Wesker) – A small, mild-mannered ventriloquist with multiple personality disorder. Under his dummy Scarface’s psychological influence, the Ventriloquist is a dangerous crime-boss.
Victor Zsasz – A mob hit man and serial killer who cuts a tally mark on to his own body for each of his victims.
Lady Shiva – A deadly martial artist from the League of Assassins.
Flamingo – A psychotic hit man who was recruited by the mob after they partially lobotomized him.
Alpha – One of the world’s most dangerous assassins and a terrorist-for-hire.
Crime Doctor (Matthew Thorne) – The go-to surgeon for all criminals and a criminal mastermind in his own right, but he stops his crimes to minister to the sick or injured.
Cypher (Avery Twombey) – A corporate spy who uses hypnotic powers to force his victims to commit suicide.
Dagger (David Rennington) – The owner of a blade manufacturing company called Rennington Steel. When facing hard times, Rennington starts masking himself as the Dagger, running an old-fashioned protection racket.
Deacon Blackfire – A religious fanatic who forms an army in the sewers, largely composed of the homeless.
Dr. Death (Dr. Karl Hellfern) – A mad scientist who develops lethal chemical gases and threatens wealthy citizens, demanding money and tribute to him in exchange for their safety.
Dr. Zodiac (Theodore B. Carrigan) – A carnival mystic who turns to crime, basing his robberies on horoscopes.
The Electrocutioner – A vigilante who kills criminals with electricity. Also eventually becomes a hit man for the mob.
Eraser (Leonard Flasco) – A professional at covering up the tracks and evidence of other people’s crimes.
The Great White Shark (Warren White) – A crooked investor who uses his business connections to serve as a liaison and fence for many criminals. Kind of like a low-rent, deformed Penguin.
Headhunter – An assassin known for shooting his victims twice in the head.
King Cobra – A crime lord that is dressed like a cobra. (Or more likely will have an affinity for cobras if he’s used in the show.)
King Tut (Professor William Omaha McElroy) – A criminal who bases his crimes around Ancient Egyptian themes. Leaves behind clues at his crimes in a similar fashion to The Riddler.
Nocturna (Natalie Metternich) – A master thief and manipulator who is sensitive to light, so she prefers to operate in darkness.
Onomatopoeia – A serial killer who targets non-powered, vigilante superheroes. He earned his name because he imitates noises around him, such as dripping taps, gunshots, etc. He is a superb athlete, martial artist, and weapons expert.
Torque (Dudley Soames) – A corrupt cop who becomes a villain after an injury that twists his head 180 degrees. He’s saved by an experimental medical technique and renames himself Torque.

More Crossover With The Flash

Faster Than A Speeding… Arrow?

The Flash is no-doubt set to be a big hit, with the trailers for it already creating some major buzz. The spin-off got its start on Arrow, and it looks like Oliver will serve as a kind-of mentor to Barry Allen as he becomes the Fastest Man Alive. While Arrow will deal with more street-level human bad guys, it looks like The Flash is set to tackle the tougher baddies with superpowers. I have no doubt that if Olly runs into a metahuman bad guy, Barry may race in to lend a hand.

But more than that, I think H.I.V.E. is going to be what ties these two shows together as a shared Big Bad which could span multiple seasons for both shows, with the two heroes having to team up to take it down. We’ve already seen Olly make a guest appearance in The Flash trailer, and I’m sure we’ll have some episodes in the middle of Season 3 where the Arrowverse and Flashverse collide, much like they did in Season 2. That kind of synergy just can’t be passed up when you have two hit shows sharing the same universe on the same network. And if Warner Bros. decides to tie in the TV universe with their Batman vs. Superman cinematic universe, we could start to see shades of the Justice League begin to form, which would undoubtedly be awesome. So awesome, in fact, that I’m convinced Warner Bros. won’t do it, because they have a track record of hating awesomeness.

More Major Characters Will Die

Sorry Babe, You’ve Outlived Your Usefulness.

Poor Tommy didn’t make it past the first season. Moira bit the big one in Season 2. And I’m thinking Season 3 is going to be a tough one for the Lances. Though I’m 90% positive Detective Lance didn’t die in the Season 2 finale, there’s a distinct possibility he could die at some point during the course of Season 3, mostly because there’s just nowhere else to go for his character. He’s already proven how awful of a detective he is (I mean, seriously dude, how could you not have figured out Olly is the Arrow by now? I know you’ve reached a point where you don’t want to know, but still, you should admit you’re smart enough to have figured it out by this point), and his whole anguish over losing his daughter has been resolved. He even got his Detective badge back, thus redeeming himself in his career. There’s pretty much nothing left for him to do and no more room for his character to grow.

But more than Detective Lance biting it, I think Sara is pretty much doomed for Season 3. My guess is that Thea will be the one who kills her, which will drive a rift between Laurel and Olly. Plus, if Laurel is ever to assume the Black Canary mantle, Sara pretty much has to die, as well as her father, so she literally has nothing left (except her mom, but nobody gives a sh*t about her). I’m thinking that if Sara dies at the end of Season 3, we’ll see Laurel break away from Team Arrow and follow in her sister’s footsteps, only now she’s determined to take down the League of Assassins as well as Malcolm Merlyn, and it will be up to Olly to bring her back from the brink of becoming the type of killer he became on the island.

Oliver’s Journey From The Vigilante To The Green Arrow Will Continue

We’ll Know His Arc Is Complete When He Sports The Van Dyke.

Finally, we’ll see Oliver continue his journey from being the cold-blooded killer he was in Season 1 to being the stalwart defender of justice he’s destined to become. His Season 2 arc was about starting that transition from The Vigilante to The Arrow, with him adopting the mask instead of that tacky eye make-up, along with a new “No Killing” philosophy which got heavily tested toward the end of the season.

DC Comics is very big on their heroes not killing, with the belief that murder doesn’t solve society’s ills, but adds to it. Vigilantes must be better than the criminals they fight and strive to uphold society’s laws, even if they must break those laws to do so. (Also, they need an excuse not to kill off their best villains so they can come back time and time again!) I was pleasantly surprised that Olly was a ruthless killer in Season 1, because I liked the darker take on the character. Though I miss that ruthlessness, I can appreciate that he’s trying to change to be something more than what he was made into. I think that’s a solid character arc and it will continue in Season 3 as we see what ARGUS trains him to become after rescuing him from his harrowing ordeal on The Amazo.

I have a feeling Olly’s no killing rule will constantly be tested throughout Season 3 as more and more challenging opponents surface. But in addition to this, I think we’ll see more of Oliver’s transition to what he’s like in the comics, being the liberal champion for the downtrodden of his city. I think Oliver will get a better sense of poverty and the underclass of Starling City, and we’ll see him realize that he could do just as much good with his family’s wealth as he could running around shooting bad guys with arrows. We saw shades of this in his dealings with Sebastian Blood, whose “man of the people” persona resonated with Olly before he revealed himself to be a villain. I think Blood’s ultimate sacrifice at the end of Season 2 will not have been a hollow gesture, as Olly will begin to see that he must both work inside of and outside of the system to save Starling City and the people who live there.

You Have Not Failed This Show

Season 3 Is Going To Be Awesome.

Congrats to the Arrow writers, producers, and actors who delivered a great Season 2. As you can tell from my long-winded diatribe, I am certainly looking forward to Season 3 and all the awesomeness the show’s creative team has in store for us. What are your theories about Season 3? Do you think I’m totally off-base, or do you agree with my predictions? Please let me know in the comments section of the post. Oh, and if you could show some love by sharing on Facebook, Twitter, and Google+, I’ll be sure to award you 10 cool points for each one. (Don’t knock Cool Points. You can trade them in for fun and prizes!)

Thanks for stopping by! Check back soon as I start my Arrow Season 2 retrospective recaps… when I get the time to write them, that is. LoL.

The post Arrow Season 3 Secrets Revealed appeared first on MatthewKadish.com.

The Blacklist Season 1 Finale Recap: Kill Them All, Let Reddington Sort Them Out…

NBC brought the #1 new hit drama of the 2014 season to an end on Monday with the shocking finale, “Berlin (Conclusion)”.  And boy, was there quite a body count!  Read on to see who made it out alive, and who didn’t…

WARNING:  MAJOR SPOILERS

The Blacklist started its first episode with master criminal Red Reddington willingly turning himself in to the FBI.  After he’s in custody, he says the only person he’ll talk to is FBI profiler Agent Elizabeth Keene.  Thus begins the premise of the show where Keene’s FBI task force goes after people on Reddington’s Blacklist, which targets some of the most elite and despicable bad guys on the planet.

From the beginning, there were a lot of mysteries.  What were Reddington’s motivations?  Why was he so interested in Elizabeth?  Why was Elizabeth being watched by a shadowy group of surveillance people?  Where did Reddington get his awesome hats?

Well, thankfully, we got answers to all these questions (except the hat one, I’m still on the edge of my seat waiting for that to drop!) in the episodes leading up to the finale.  Here’s what we know…

Reddington’s Secrets Revealed

Reddington knew there was a secret enemy who was targeting him for destruction.
Reddington compiled the Blacklist as a way of tracking down this enemy.
Reddington has a connection to Elizabeth Keene that only he seems to know about.
Reddington discovered his secret enemy learned of his connection to Elizabeth.
Reddington turned himself in not only to help protect Elizabeth, but to co-opt the resources of the United States government to help flush out his secret enemy by taking down members of the Blacklist.

Now that we know what Reddington’s motivations were, all the early episodes of the Blacklist make a lot more sense.  I was always curious why Elizabeth’s husband Tom was a mole, and what it was that made Elizabeth so special.  Here are some of the secrets that were revealed in the finale:

The Blacklist’s Big Bad Is Revealed

Reddington’s secret adversary, code named Berlin, is a former KGB superspy who blames Reddington for the gruesome death of his daughter.
Berlin has been waging a secret war against Reddington, and was the one who sent Tom undercover as Elizabeth’s husband in case Reddington made contact with her.
Berlin survived the plane crash by cutting off his own hand and disguising himself as a prison guard to evade capture by the FBI.
Berlin created his own Blacklist, focusing on member’s of the FBI task force Reddington was using, and sent hired killers after them.

The body counts quickly began racking up right from the start of the episode.  Lots of prisoners died from the plane crash, but the big deaths were those of series regulars…

The Bodies Hit The Floor

First, the team’s CIA liaison, Meera, dun went and got her throat slit by Berlin’s assassins.  It was a pretty gruesome death, but then again, Meera’s been on borrowed time ever since she was the one who betrayed Reddington to Anslo Garrick, who raided the task force’s blacksite and killed Reddington’s hot Asian assistant/girlfriend.  So I suppose this wasn’t a big loss, but Meera was considered a series regular, so her death did have some impact.

Then the leader of the task force, Agent Harold Cooper, gets garrotted in his car.  Somehow the assassin didn’t quite finish the job (lazy Communist work-ethic there) and Cooper is brought to the hospital in really bad shape.  Though I like his character, I feel it was a bit of a cop-out to leave Cooper alive and tease that he’s going to be okay at the end of the episode.  His death would have had a far bigger impact than Meera’s.

Finally Elizabeth kills Tom after he kidnaps her and uses her as a human shield when Reddington gets all Jack Bauer on Berlin’s assassin.  In a struggle with her betraying husband, Elizabeth shoots Tom in the gut with his own gun.  She then uses said gun to put two more in him for good measure.  (Sadly, she did not get to say “Consider this a divorce” at any point during the shooting.)  Before he dies, Tom and Liz share a tender moment where Tom whispers some secret to her.  Oddly enough, Tom’s body is not found when the FBI arrive, possibly leaving an opening for him to return at some point, though Liz specifically says he’s dead at the end of the episode.

The Blacklist Season 1 Wrap-Up

Though Team Reddington over at the FBI is now safe, they finally figure out that Berlin was the security guard who got his hand cut off, something which most audiences figured out the moment Peter Stormare showed up playing said guard.  The reveal probably would have worked better with a less recognizable actor.  Stormare never plays minor throw-away characters like that.  He’s too good of an actor, and does “super-evil bad guy” exceptionally well.  Though Berlin didn’t die in this episode, his beard did.  R.I.P. awesome Russian prisoner villain beard.  We hardly knew ye.

The episode winded down with Liz deciding to continue working with the Blacklist squad, despite the fact that Reddington killed her adoptive daddy, all due to the magic of a kid’s toy bracelet which reminded her that despite Reddington’s evil genius at work, they actually did a lot of good being his unwitting pawns in his entirely selfish plan for self-preservation.

As Liz sits with Reddington, we get a recap of how Liz remembers her real father rescuing her from a fire when she was young before handing her off to her adoptive dad.  Reddington reveals that her real father is dead and that she can never know who he truly is because that knowledge would put her in terrible danger.  (Though, to be fair, she’s kinda been in terrible danger a ton of times already, so not sure how this tease of a secret helps Liz in any way.)

Though Reddington has denied being Liz’s actual father, the episode ends with a reveal the Reddington has horrible burn scars on his back, which implies he was the one who rescued Liz from the fire she remembers, and that he actually is, in fact, her father – which would explain his connection with her and why she’s so important to him.  (I’ve theorized Red’s actually Liz’s father since the first episode, and there have been hints throughout the season that is actually the case, so this isn’t a huge shocker for me.)

My Theory About What’s Going On

So with a successful first season under our belts, I’m now prepared to offer my theory on what exactly is happening with The Blacklist.

First of all, let’s remember that Reddington started off as an officer in Naval Intelligence before assuming his career as a criminal mastermind.  He also never heard of or recognized Berlin before recent events.  We also know that Berlin was a high-ranking and ruthless KGB officer who was imprisoned in the gulag for protecting his beloved daughter from his enemies and getting her out of Russia.  His daughter is then kidnapped by Berlin’s enemies and pieces of her are sent to his prison cell to torment him, until he escapes and goes seeking revenge.  For some reason, he holds Reddington responsible.

The end of the episode has Reddington looking at a picture of Berlin’s dead daughter’s body, the same one that was sent to Berlin in his prison cell to taunt him.  Though one could read that as a clue that Reddington did kill her, I actually think it means something different.

I think that as a Naval Intelligence Officer, Reddington met Berlin’s daughter and turned her into an asset, which is why she had to flee Russia.  Reddington fell in love with her, and helped her to escape back to America, where he married her.  They had a child, which is Elizabeth.  Berlin’s enemies tracked them down and kidnapped Berlin’s daughter while setting fire to the house.  Reddington rescuse his daughter, but realizes she’ll never be safe because of Berlin’s enemies.  He claims she died in the fire while he hands her off to a trusted friend to raise her as his own, as Red goes off to rescue his wife.

Reddington eventually tracks down his wife’s kidnappers, but he’s too late.  She’s already been killed.  Reddington takes the photo of her dead body to remind him to stay focused on his revenge.  Knowing he can’t do what’s needed to the people responsible for this within the boundaries of the law, he leaves Naval Intelligence and becomes a criminal, hoping he take the focus of whoever was responsible for his wife’s death away from Liz and keep it on him.

What he doesn’t know is that his wife’s father is still alive and in prison.  When Berlin finally escapes, he eventually discovers Red’s connection to his daughter and blames him for her death, thus sparking his quest for revenge.  He does not know that Red actually loved his daughter, and that Lizzy is his biological grand-daughter.

What’s To Come In The Blacklist Season 2

That’s my rough theory about what’s going on here.  My guess is we’ll see more of this be revealed in season 2, where I’m certain Liz will at least figure out Red is her actual father.  I’m also willing to bet Ressler and Liz start getting it on, since they’re now both single thanks to the tragic deaths of their former lovers.

I’m also willing to bet we get some new team members in season 2, now that one regular has bit the dust.  And as Berlin’s quest for vengeance intensified, he’ll no doubt be hiring new Blacklisters to give the FBI some trouble.  Now we’ll get to see Red’s evil genius face-off with Berlin’s eviler genius, in what is sure to be an evil genius battle royal.

What were your thoughts about the finale?  What are your Blacklist theories?  let me know in the comments below!

The post The Blacklist Season 1 Finale Recap: Kill Them All, Let Reddington Sort Them Out… appeared first on MatthewKadish.com.

Good News & Bad News: What Awesome Shows Are Getting Cancelled?

After finishing the rough draft of Earthman Jack vs. The Secret Army, I took a nice little break over the weekend to catch up with my TV viewing.  And sadly, I discovered that some awesome shows that I love will not be returning next season.  I feel as though just when it had appeared I had finally gotten the upper-hand on my DVR, it turned to me and said “Oh, you think you’ve won do you?  Well enjoy your precious shows while you can!  For they will NOT be returning ever again!  Mwuahahahaha!”

Damn you, DVR.  Damn you straight to hell.

Awesome Shows That Have Been Cancelled

So here’s the scoop on the awesome shows that got the axe:

Community:  Without a doubt, one of the best comedies on TV just got canned by the peacock network.  NBC has produced some truly classic comedies in its day, such as 30 Rock and Seinfeld, but I always felt like Community was a special breed of comedy genius.  The writing and acting on this show were always so incredible.  The way they could take simple concepts such as paintball or Dungeons & Dragons and make epic, memorable episodes out of them was truly inspired.  There was a gag ongoing in the show about 6 seasons and a movie, and unfortunately, it looks as though 5 seasons is all they’re going to get.  But man, do I hope they’re able to make that movie!

Believe:  Another amazing show that never really got a chance to find its legs.  Produced by Alfonzo Cuaron (the director of Gravity) and J.J. Abrams, this show was based around a little girl with special psychic gifts on the run from an evil corporation with only her long-lost father for protection.  I felt the show was not only beautiful to watch but its stories were smart and inspiring, and the actors were really good, especially the one playing the little girl.  I feel it got a bad time slot on Sunday nights against stiff competition, and it really should have been given more love by the network because it was a very high quality show.

Revolution:  Though I’m about a season behind on this show, I’m sad that NBC decided to pull the plug on it.  (Get it?  GET IT?  I’m freakin’ funny!)  Though the show always walked that fine line between awesome and terrible, it was always enjoyable, and I really liked seeing Billy Burke be a bad ass.  They guy is just very watchable to me for some reason.  As sad as I am to see this show go, I feel like NBC did give it a fair shake.  For some reason, it just didn’t connect with audiences.

Dracula:  NBC put a stake through the Johnathan Rhys Meyers vampire drama.  After watching the first season, I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised.  The show looked ridiculously expensive.  It was not only a period drama, but very gothic with lots of special effects, gore, and action.  I think it plays well as a stand-alone mini-series, but it would have been good to see where the producers were going with it.

Crisis:  This was a show I’d written off early on.  The commercials made it look about as generic as a political thriller could get.  I was actually surprised when I watched the first episode and found myself enjoying it.  However, I had to drop the show because there were too many other good shows on the same night competing for my attention.  I don’t feel Crisis was a big loss, but it might have been a quality program if given enough time.

Almost Human:  We all know how much FOX loves to cancel excellent Sci-Fi shows.  And unfortunately, the futuristic buddy-cop drama about a human detective and his android partner went the way of Firefly – taken from us far too early.  I felt like this show was just starting to find its legs when it got them cut out from under them.

Mind Games:  This was another show that had a lot of potential that just couldn’t quite seem to get its footing.  Christian Slater and Steve Zahn played brothers who start a business which uses covert influence tactics to change people’s lives without them ever knowing it.  Imagine hiring people to perform “Jedi Mind Tricks,” and you’ll get an idea of what they do.  Every episode essentially had the team pulling off an intricate con job, and Slater played his role of the smarmy, con-artist brother to a tee.  The big weakness of the show was making Steve Zahn’s character bi-polar, which meant he’d usually fly off the handle and self-sabotage most of their endeavors, which just made you not like the character despite his shining moments of brilliance.  Again, this show aired on a competitive night and I had to drop it.  But it was a pretty strong offering from ABC.

Bad Shows I’m Glad Got Cancelled

Now there were other shows that got cancelled that weren’t as awesome as the ones I just listed.  In fact, some of them I’m very glad to see go.  They are:

Intelligence:  I really wanted this show to be good, mostly due to the fact that I’m a fan of Josh Holloway, and Meghan Ory is one of the most gorgeous women I’ve ever had the pleasure of seeing on TV.  (Seriously, she should be Wonder Woman, people.)  But it was not good.  In fact, it was horribly boring.  The concept was kind-of neat, but in a way, it reminded me of a high-tech version of the Poppy Montgomery show Unforgettable.  It was a very standard procedural where we’re supposed to be impressed with the digital walk-throughs Holloway reconstructs in his head.  But that got boring after episode one, and the story with his wife never made any sense or was the least bit interesting.  That, and Holloway and Ory had zero chemistry together.  The show’s attempt to set up the mythology behind the “chip” in Holloway’s head was good, but it ultimately didn’t go anywhere.  I gave up on this show after 4 episodes, so I’m not surprised it didn’t make it.

Hostages:  I tried watching the first episode, but it was so formulaic and stupid that I gave up about 2/3rds of the way through and didn’t watch another episode again.  I like Dylan McDermott a lot but I never have and never will be a Toni Collette fan.  Hostages fell into the trap of having a very limited concept that just couldn’t carry it forward past 1 season without forcing itself to go in radically different directions.  This is similar to the issues series like 24 faced, where they’d have to resolve the main crisis halfway through the season and then come up with a brand new crisis to take it to the finish line no matter how contrived or ridiculous it might have been.  Glad to see this is one Hostage that didn’t get rescued.  (I TOLD you I was freakin’ funny!)

The Crazy Ones:  I love Sarah Michelle Geller.  I want to have little Buffy babies with her.  I love Robin Williams.  I want to do piles of cocaine with him.  How is it possible having the two of them together on screen could be painful to watch?  I don’t know, but David E. Kelley somehow found a way.  Geller has some comic chops, but she just couldn’t keep up with Williams.  In fact, I think the show’s biggest problem was that NO ONE could keep up with him.  Whenever he was on screen he was doing his manic Mork act, whether it made sense or not.  It was as though the show was trying way too hard to be funny.  The potential for satirizing the consumer ad industry was massive, and they missed every opportunity they had to be clever on this show.  I think it was the episode where I was forced to watch Robin Williams sing with Kelly Clarkson about sex in an effort to land an account for McDonalds where I decided if I continued watching this show, I was going to willingly dunk my head in a bucket of bleach.  I wish these two actors the best of luck in their next shows, but I am so happy to see this one end.

The Michael J. Fox Show:  This was one of the shows I was really looking forward to this season and it was also one of the biggest disappointments.  It committed the cardinal sin of comedy – it just wasn’t funny.  I think Michael J. Fox is great, and its sad that he’s been struck with such an awful disease.  I really wanted him to succeed but I think the brains behind this show let him down.  The only funny parts in any of the episodes that I watched were when Wendell Pierce was on screen.  He literally stole every scene he was in.  Fox’s family was annoying beyond belief, and Fox himself had a hard time delivering his punchlines.  Both Family Ties and Spin City showed what Fox was capable of when he had the right material.  I think putting the focus on his irritating TV family was a mistake.  I’d have much rather seen more of what he did when he guest-starred on Curb Your Enthusiasm.  That showed how incredibly funny he could be, even when addressing his disease head-on.

Ironside:  A generic NBC cop drama.  The twist?  The tough cop is in a wheelchair!  Yes, I know its a remake of the Raymond Burr show of the same name, but its hard to take Blaire Underwood as a serious threat to crime when he can’t walk on his own two feet.  The original Ironside worked because Burr didn’t try to be a tough guy, he used his wits to catch criminals and proved he could be a cop without having to be physical.  This show had Underwood torturing suspects under interrogation.  It just didn’t ring true.  The writing was bad, the concept was bad, and the acting was bad.  Over-all, it was just a bad show.  Glad to see its gone.

Dads:  The new comedy from the creator of the Family Guy was no Family Guy.  Heck, it wasn’t even American Dad.  It was just… truly awful.  I think Seth Green is hilarious and Seth MacFarlane has proven he’s a comedy genius, but this this sitcom was horribly unfunny and uncomfortable to watch.  Not to mention Martin Mull and Peter Riegert were both creepy and not funny in the slightest.  I could see what they were trying to do with the show, but it just never really worked.  The Green/MacFarlane comedy works very well with animation and dolls, but not so much with live actors.  FOX actually got this one right.

Rake:  I’ve been a fan of Greg Kinnear’s since I used to watch him host Talk Soup on the fledgling E! network back when I was a kid.  The guy has a humor and charm to him that I’ve always really enjoyed and it saddens me he’s not a bigger star than he is.  When I saw that he was going to be headlining an hour-long legal drama about a skeezy lawyer, I was very excited, because I thought it was the perfect break-out vehicle for him to showcase his talents.  Sadly, it just never hit the right notes.  I gave the show 4 episodes before writing it off.  Though I felt Kinnear did a good job, the writing of the show never clicked.  I feel like it should have been a legal version of House in a way, but Kinnear’s character was never enough of an ass hole to truly fall in love with him the way one did with Hugh Laurie.  It’s like the show couldn’t decide how much they wanted to commit to making Kinnear’s character unredeemable, and it suffered because of it.

The X Factor:  F**k you Simon Cowell.  That is all.

Suburgatory:  This was a show that had a lot of potential.  It had a great cast, and the satirical nature with which it took on its suburban setting was extremely well done.  I feel like Jane Levy is a breakout star.  Not only is she extremely beautiful, but she’s got great timing and delivery, and her daddy/daughter chemistry with Jeremy Sisto was spot-on.  The supporting cast here was also top notch, with Alan Tudyk, Cheryl Hines, Chris Parnell, Rex Lee, and Ana Gasteyer all delivering solid supporting performances that were (usually) funny.  The show almost had a Clueless vibe to it, mixed with a Janeane Garofalo type of wit and a Simpson-esque satirical tone.  Unfortunately, those three things just never jived into the type of laugh-out-loud humor something like Modern Family has.  And when you’re leading in to that level of comedy, it’s hard to stand out from the crowd.

Super Fun Night:  Much like the Michael J. Fox Show, I really wanted to like Super Fun Night, mostly because Rebel Wilson is ridiculously funny.  She stole the show as “Fat Amy” in Pitch Perfect.  I actually think the big flaw in Super Fun Night was that Rebel Wilson shines when she’s obnoxious, and in the show, she played her character as too insecure and reserved.  Her humor is very much like the type Chris Farley had when he was alive.  He was at his best when he was obnoxious, and so is she.  Because of this choice, the show suffered and never came off as all that funny.  After all, there is only so many times a show can make fun of its star being fat before the joke get old.  If Rebel gets another shot at a show, I hope she goes for the jugular like she did in Pitch Perfect.  I think it would work far better for her and audiences.

Once Upon A Time In Wonderland:  Though I’m a fan of Once Upon A Time, its spin-off left a lot to be desired.  I feel like this show tried to do far too much too quickly.  Once Upon A Time worked because we got to know the characters before all the crazy fairy tale stuff really started to happen.  With Wonderland, we hit the ground running, and really didn’t have time to get to know Alice or Knave all that well before diving into the fantasy setting.  Also, the romance between Alice and the Genie Cyrus was never all that well developed.  Once Upon A Time really showed us how Charming and Snow White fell in love, whereas in Wonderland Cyrus and Alice are soul-mates after sitting in Cyrus’s lamp for a few minutes.  The villains in the show were also extremely under-developed.  The Red Queen, played with pouty-lipped irritation by Emma Rigby, sucked all the life out of every scene she appeared in because she was so painfully generic.  Naveen Andrews as Jaffar was an inspired choice, and he was a much better villain, but he wasn’t enough to save the show from its tedium.  I feel like the show might have been better served if Alice was new to Wonderland and the audience was discovering it alongside her, instead of being thrust into an adventure to rescue a lost love with an Alice who knows how to swordfight and kick all kinds of butt.  Wonderland came off as more of an attempt to cash in on the success of Once Upon A Time than it did as an attempt to make a genuinely good show.

Killer Women:  I certainly consider myself a Tricia Helfer fan after her breakout role in Battlestar Galactica.  And the commercials for Killer Women certainly caught my fancy.  I mean, how could a show about a sexy Texas Ranger hunting down sexy killer women be bad?  Well, it was.  Extremely.  I gave up after 2 episodes and didn’t look back.  Here’s hoping Tricia gets another series that allows her to be sexy and awesome without the bad writing this show had.  (Seriously, someone get this woman on Justified for something!)

The Carrie Diaries:  A teen version of Sex in the City without the Sex?  I’m surprised it lasted as long as it did.

Star-Crossed:  The CW’s alien high school drama is leaving Earth never to come back again.  A cross between Alien Nation and West Side Story, this show was about aliens who look like underwear models going to high school on Earth.  As if that concept wasn’t enough to make you hate it, the cliched writing and poor performances should.  It was a bad attempt at a sci-fi teen drama, which shows like The 100 are doing soooooooo much better.  Good-bye and good riddance.

The Tomorrow People:  I saw the writing on the wall for this show the moment it lost its Arrow lead-in.  I tried really, really, REALLY hard to like this show, but it was not meant to be.  This show was incredibly stupid, poorly written, and its leading man couldn’t act his way out of a paper bag.  I appreciate the attempt to make a teen-friendly X-Men show, but the (puny) brains behind this series just couldn’t deliver.  I feel like my decision to drop it is now justified.  My only regret is that Peyton List is going to have to find a new job.  Hopefully she gets another show soon so I can continue watching something with her beautiful face in it.  And someone give Mark Pellegrino his own show already.  That guy is awesome.

Awesome Shows That Got Renewed

It’s not all bad news and heartbreak.  There is still reason to have faith in TV!  Some truly great shows got renewed, so we get to enjoy them further.  Here are the big ones:

The Blacklist:  Though I’m not as high on this show as I was when it first began, its proven to be an enjoyable series so far.  And NBC is doubling down on The Blacklist, basing its new season around it and giving it the choice slot right after the Superbowl in February to get it some big exposure.  They’ll be moving The Blacklist from Mondays at 10 pm to Thursdays at 9 pm so that they can use its lead-in to launch other shows.  I really hope we get to see Reddington be more of an evil genius and less of Elizabeth’s silly love-life drama in season 2.  But all things considered, this is a win for genre fans.

Hannibal:  I’m most excited to see Hannibal get a 3rd season order.  I began watching this show with a lot of skepticism and was genuinely surprised at how incredibly well-written it is.  This show truly captures the horrific and suspenseful tone of the books its based on, and frankly, I’m surprised its on network TV and not a paid cable station like HBO.  This show has some of the best writing and acting on TV right now, and though it has elements of a typical crime procedural to it, it never fails to take it in a shocking and disturbing new direction.  It’s a visually stunning show, as well as an insightful character drama, with lots of suspense, mind games, and twists-and-turns.  The introduction of Mason Verger this season has been a pleasing surprise and I’m looking forward to seeing his story plays out (considering how he ends up in the books).  The twist the show took with Dr. Chilton shows all preconceived notions about where the story is going is off, and rumor has it season 3 starts to get into Silence of the Lambs territory.  But most of all, I really wanna see what happens after that fight between Hannibal and Jack Crawford!

Brooklyn Nine-Nine:  Andy Samberg’s first post-SNL show has been a delight to watch.  The cast is great, and most of all, the show is hilarious.  It seemed like a bit of a risk to make a sitcom based around cops, but oddly enough, it works, and it works extremely well.  Its one of the biggest must-see comedies on TV in my book.

New Girl:  Like Brooklyn Nine-Nine, New Girl is one of the funniest and most original comedies on TV.  I didn’t have much hope for this show when it first started, but its proven to be a blast to watch.  The characters are wonderful and there isn’t an episode that goes by without me laughing my butt off.  And now that Coach (Damon Waynes Jr.) is back in the mix, it can only get better!

Sleepy Hollow:  Though FOX made the mistake of cancelling Almost Human, it got something right by renewing Sleepy Hollow.  I didn’t like the first episode, but this show has grown on me and gotten to be really good.  It reminds me of what X-Files was like back in its hey-day.  The cross between National Treasure and Hellraiser actually works, and the cliffhanger we got at the end of season one was a genuine shocking twist that left me wanting more.  This show is spooky, cool, and lots of fun.  I can’t wait to see more of it!

Agents Of SHIELD:  After a slow start, this show has kicked up into high gear with the emergence of HYDRA and things don’t look to be slowing down.  With the show finally hitting its stride, I’m really looking forward to season 2 and beyond, especially with all the tie-ins that will no-doubt be related to Avengers 2.  The cast is finally starting to gel and the writing is proving to be excellent, with lots of things from the early episodes starting to finally pay off.  And with even more comic-book based shows on the horizon, its encouraging to see the networks continuing to foster series like this.

Modern Family:  The best sitcom on TV.  Period.  And it’s back yet again!

Once Upon A Time:  This show is a guilty pleasure, since it’s usually pretty contrived, but it’s still fun to see all the Disney fairy tale properties get utilized every week.  The writing for the show has been consistently good and the cast is great (with a few minor exceptions).  For fantasy and sci-fi fans, it’s a good thing to see it come back.  Though after Neverland and Oz, I’m wondering where the show is going to go next (Rumor has it they’re going with Frozen?).  Glad I’ll have the opportunity to find out!

Elementary:  Though I’m glad this show is returning, I have a love/hate relationship with Elementary.  Its never reached the heights of greatness it’s BBC counterpart Sherlock has.  And some of the liberties the writers take with Sherlock Holmes mythology can be maddening.  But it’s a solid procedural show with a good leading man and smart writing.  Sometimes, it can be borderline boring with it’s “case of the week” nature, but Johnny Lee Miller’s take on Sherlock always ends up redeeming it.  I’d just like to see more battle of wits between Sherlock and an evil genius.  The episodes where he was combating Moriarty were always the most fun to watch.

Person Of Interest:  One of the best dramas on TV, this show has really taken off this season with the emergence of Samaritan and the anti-surveillance group Vigilance.  The set-up for the “secret war” between the Machine and the Decima-backed Samaritan is gripping and suspenseful, and the cast continues to get rounded out wonderfully.  Amy Acker’s Root has become like a super-hero with her constant connection to the Machine, and the villains in the show keep getting more powerful and harder for the heroes to defeat.  I said when this show first started it was like a quasi-realistic take on Batman, and with each season, this gets more and more true.  The mythology this show is building is rich and full of potential.  I can’t wait for next season.

The 100:  I’ve been meaning to do a write-up about this show for a while but haven’t had the time.  It’s hands-down the best new sci-fi show out there at the moment.  One would think a CW drama about 100 teens being stranded on a post-apocalyptic Earth might be bad, but it’s the exact opposite.  This show is very adult and does a fantastic job of showing the hardship these characters must struggle through.  Unlike a show like The Tomorrow People, The 100 actually follows the logic of its setting, and the characters react accordingly.  The political drama on the “ark” space-station dovetails nicely with the survival drama on the ground.  There are no annoying characters, and the characters who are “evil” have legit justification for their actions.  I knew this show was of a different breed when one episode had the characters fail to rescue 300 people from being killed up on the ark at the last moment, like what might typically happen in a show like this.  That really told its audience that shit show wasn’t afraid to be dark and have tragic consequences for the actions its characters took.  This show certainly hasn’t been shy about killing off its characters, which makes it a gripping show to watch.  Definitely one of the best new offerings from the CW.

Arrow:  The best superhero show on TV right now, bar none.  Season 1 was good.  Season 2 is even better.  The show is doing an amazing job of bringing the DC Universe to the small screen, and the trials and tribulations Oliver Queen faces are impressive and entertaining to watch.  It still struggles occasionally with poor subplots (Laurel *cough**cough*), but its supporting cast is amazing and the villains are super fun.  Deathstroke has been an awesome big bad this season, and Oliver’s transformation from the “Vigilante” to “The Arrow” has been quite the character arc.  I’m hoping this show lasts a long, long time, because it is pure fun to watch every week.  It really is like Christopher Nolan’s Batman brought to the small screen, with a nice dose of Smallville thrown into the mix just for the hell of it.

Shows That I Don’t Care About That Got Renewed And Maybe Shouldn’t Have

While its sad to see beloved shows get cancelled, it can be even more frustrating to see undeserving shows get another lease on life.  Here are the programs that got a renewal they probably didn’t deserve:

Grimm:  I’m surprised this show is still on, let alone that people actually seem to like it.  I tried really hard to get into it its first season, but the show just wasn’t for me.  I found the writing to be very cheesy, along with the FX.  I’ll always root for a sci-fi/fantasy show to succeed, but Grimm is a show I wouldn’t miss if it went away.

The Following:  The first season of this much-hyped show was stupidly awful.  The second season wasn’t nearly as bad, but it still wasn’t a great show.  How or why FOX decided it was good enough to bring it back for a season 3 is beyond me.  It probably should have wrapped itself up at the end of Season 2.

Castle:  I love Nathan Fillion and wish him only the best, but Castle just gets more and more ridiculous the longer it goes on.  This season’s 70′s episode was definitely the “Jump The Shark” moment for the series.  When the show focuses on things like the 3XK killer, Castle’s CIA assassin father, or Becket’s mother’s overblown conspiracy-laden murder, the show is pretty entertaining.  Other than that, it’s week-to-week procedural format is tired and boring.  If I were a suspect in a murder and there was a writer in the room interrogating me with no police authority whatsoever, I’d never admit anything to the guy.  Castle’s initial premise of having a mystery writer actually solve mysteries with a cop was a good one, but its gotten played out.  Even the Castle/Becket romance is reaching its conclusion.  It’s probably time to put this show to bed and get something more original on the screen.

Revenge:  The first season of this show was pretty good, but it quickly overplayed its hand.  It’s now about as ridiculous as a show can get in terms of the melodrama that’s going on in it.  This show would have worked far better as a mini-series.

Hawaii Five-O:  Boring police drama set in Hawaii that keeps cycling in LOST cast members.  Surely there are better shows that could be put on the air?

The Millers:  The least funny sitcom Will Arnet has ever been in.  Why renew this?  Why???

Beauty And The Beast:  There is nothing beautiful about this horribly stupid show.

Helix:  The single worst sci-fi show I think I’ve ever had the misfortune of being subjected to.  I kept watching it hoping against hope it would get better, but it only got worse.  And SyFy renews it, but cancels Warehouse 13?  You’d think they’re owned by FOX making decisions like that.  Ronald Moore lost a ton of cool points with this series.  I’ve given up on it.

Well, that’s the good news and bad news concerning the TV shows of this past season and their futures.  Though I am still sad and distraught, there are lots of new shows in the pipeline which look like they’re going to be awesome, most notably Gotham, Constantine, and The Flash.  Hopefully when next fall rolls around, we’ll see some very strong offerings from the networks that will make us forget about the shows we lost this season.

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EJ2 Update: It’s Done!

Hey everyone.

Well, it’s 6:48 pm Pacific time on Wednesday, May 7th, and I just completed the final chapter for the rough draft of Earthman Jack vs. The Secret Army.

I.  Am.  So.  Happy.

The first book took me 4 years to write, working on it sporadically as I found the time and inspiration to do so.  This book took me two months of intensive writing, working pretty much 8 hours a day every single day.  The final page count, not including any pages devoted to titles and dedications or stuff like that, is around 590 manuscript pages.  The final word count is 245,245.  This is the longest freakin’ thing I’ve ever written, and my brain is fried.  I’ve basically been locked in my house for two months straight, chained to my desk, doing nothing but writing (and occasionally eating and going to the bathroom).

It was a struggle at times, but over-all, I’m very happy with how the book turned out.  The ending portion was especially fun to write, and it went extremely quickly compared to the beginning and middle.  The plan now is to take the rest of the week off and veg out in front of the TV while I binge-watch all the shows that have accumulated on my DVR in my absence.  Once I’ve recuperated, I’ll return to the draft and start reading through it from the beginning to start the rewriting process.  I wrote everything in bits and pieces, so now it’s time to go back through and re-read it as a whole and make notes of any errors or issues I come across.  I’ll probably make 3 passes through the book before I move on to the next phase, which will be having beta readers evaluate it for me.

Whew.  Well, I am spent!  But I just wanted to go on the record and say The Secret Army is now complete.

Mwuahahahaha.

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Almost Human Canceled. More Proof FOX Hates Good Sci-Fi

Bad news for sci-fi fans everywhere.  FOX just announced it is cancelling it’s futuristic buddy cop drama Almost Human, about the adventures of a grizzled cop and his robotic partner in a Blade Runner-esque society where huge leaps in technology have invented new forms of crime.

FOX released this official statement earlier today:

We’re very pleased to announce the cancellation of Almost Human to make more room in our schedule for reality series such as So You Think You Can Twerk and yet another sitcom from the creator of The Mindy Project, the hilarious A Fat Girl & Her Relationship Problems.  While we’re well aware that Almost Human had an amazing cast, quality writing, incredible set design and special effects, and was one of the most well-received new shows of last Fall, with a very loyal fan base… we honestly just don’t give a sh*t.  Much like Firefly and other excellent sci-fi shows on our network that came before it, we just got bored after watching the first episode and kind-of forgot about it until renewal season came up.  And by then, we were like “whatevs!”  To our credit, at least we (mostly) ran the episodes in order instead of making the storylines totally nonsensical.  We do that sometimes just for giggles.  But our policy here at FOX is that any scripted hour-long drama that isn’t Glee is pretty much lame, so Almost Human had to go.  And to all those sci-fi nerds out there butthurt about this announcement, please don’t bother mounting any campaigns to try and save this failure of a show.  That never works.  In other news, we have renewed the successful Family Guy for 80 more seasons!

(WARNING:  Not actual official statement from FOX)

So, yeah, I’m sad to see this show go.  It wasn’t groundbreaking or anything, but the chemistry between the two leads was really good, and the writing was pretty witty.  The technology they came up with was also really interesting.  I think this show fell into the trap of not setting up its primary story arc quick enough, so it came off as a bit too episodic and slow most of the time.  I’m sure FOX was wondering “why are we spending all this money on what’s essentially a cop drama that could be made without all these special effects?”  In fact, my theory (beyond FOX just hating good sci-fi series) is that the show’s budget was just too big to justify its ratings.

It’s a shame, because this show was the best looking sci-fi show on TV.  Seriously, the set design work and the effects were extremely high quality.  Some of the sets were very reminiscent of Blade Runner.  I would have liked to have seen where the show would have gone, with the whole “criminals who use technology that outpaces the police” angle.  They laid the groundwork for some interesting storylines in the future, like John Laroquette’s character setting up a robot revolution.  But sadly, I guess we’ll never get to see that play out.

Just chalk this up to yet another failed J.J. Abrams sci-fi/fantasy show on FOX.  How is it FOX has the balls to make these amazing shows, but never has the guts to stick with them?

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EJ2 Update: The Secret Army Marches On (And On, And On, And On…)

Here’s a quick (maybe) update on the progress on Earthman Jack vs. The Secret Army, for those of you who care.

I’m still plugging along, writing my little fingers to their wee nubs.  I feel as though I’m running a marathon on a treadmill.  The finish line is in the distance, and yet, it never seems to be getting any closer.  I’m 430 manuscript pages in, so I’d say I’m about 2/3rds done with the book’s rough draft, but man-oh-man, it feels like I have so much further to go!  Every scene and chapter I complete is like a shallow victory, because so many more loom before me.  Some days the writing is effortless and simply flows out of me.  Other days, I’d much rather wallow in the brain-dead simple comforts of Facebook, Twitter, and online pornography.  (Just kidding about that last part mom!)

For the most part, I’m happy with what I’m coming up with.  The adventure Jack and the gang are on this time around is very different from the first one.  This book is very much where the “space opera epic” nature of the story begins to kick in, and it has been a lot of work establishing all the people, places, and things I need to in order to create a believable world for the story to take place.  Writing for Earth is easy.  Writing for a made-up planet is quite the challenge, and I didn’t realize just how challenging it was until I sat down to do it.  Luckily, I had most of the worldbuilding mapped out beforehand, so I am able to refer to my notes when needed (which saves me so much time in the writing process, let me tell you!).  But finding ways to layer that information into the story that isn’t info-dumpy and flows in an entertaining fashion can be a puzzle at times.

My continuing concern is that the book is going to be much longer than I would like it to be.  I’ve always defended long books in the past, because I don’t mind reading a massive tome as long as its good.  However, while I’m writing EJ2, I keep fretting over how much set-up I have to supply in order to pay off some of the plot later in the story.  The book is divided up into 3 episodes, and the first and third episodes are both normal lengths, however, the middle episode is shaping up to be extremely long.  I’m not going to edit myself at this stage, because I think its best to get everything in my head down on paper first, and then when I go back and start re-reading what I’ve written, I’ll be better able to see what can be cut and what can’t.  That’s where I can begin tightening things up.  Still, the length worries me.  Createspace only allows you to publish up to 800 pages in a book, I believe.  Anything bigger than that, and the binding just won’t support it.  Earthman Jack vs. The Ghost Planet was 668 pages long, and that was pushing it.  I’m worried this one might be closer to 800 once it’s formatted.  I really don’t want to split it up, because I’d prefer to keep it as a single volume in the series, so my goal is to bring the book in at under 800 pages (preferably way under).  Luckily, I don’t think I’ll have this problem with book three, because I won’t have to do as much set-up after this book.  But you never know.

I was hoping to have the book done by the end of April, but unfortunately, that will not be the case.  The goalpost for the completion of the rough draft has been moved back to the end of May.  Because it’s taking longer to finish the book, it’s going to take longer to polish it and get it edited, etc. once all the re-writes are completed.  So my gut is telling me the book won’t be ready for the summer like I’d originally planned.  I’m thinking it might have to wait for a November release, depending upon how long it takes to get everything reader-ready.

Anywho, there you go!  Another update for all you Earthman Jack fans.  I know many of you are eager to find out what happens next, and I’m sorry you have to wait so long.  I really wish I could crank these books out in a week or something, but I just can’t.  I care too much about the story and have to take my time with it.  But look at it this way – it took me four years to finish the first book!  Book two will be completed a year after the first, and it is WAY longer and more complex than The Ghost Planet was!  So I’m not quite and the George R.R. Martin level of taking 5 years in-between books to complete them… yet. lol.  I’m hoping to do at least one EJ book a year until the series is completed.  Any and all support you fans grant me (all two of you who read the blog – hi mom!) is much appreciated and as always, inspires me to keep working at it!

Until the next update, stay frosty my friends!

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