TV Tidbits 71 - Reaper

Robert and I haven't yet watched the last few episodes of Reaper (I think we're delaying because of some misguided feeling that the longer we wait, the more likely the show will come back) and while I'm sure it was good, I'm also fairly certain it didn't get to tie up all the loose ends completely. And it looks like I am correct (boo) - TVGuide.com posted this interview with Sam and Sock on their site yesterday:

How dead is Reaper? Although star Bret Harrison tells us a comic book about the canceled CW series is in the works, that's the only way the hellish adventures of Sam and Sock are likely to continue anytime soon. Tyler Labine, who played Sock to Harrison's Sam, says syndication speculation is groundless: "I think it's not officially, officially dead but as far as everyone is concerned, it's over," he says. Of course, the two would happily reunite for a movie. "Yeah, the R-rated version of Reaper," Harrison says. "There's a lot of things you do on set before you shoot the actual taping that would be a lot of fun." To mark the second and final season's recent release on DVD, the pair also talked about why they wish the show had gone to hell.

TVGuide.com: Reaper's season finale left us hanging. Viewers aren't sure where the show would have gone if it were renewed. Any guesses?
Harrison: I feel like we could have had a better finale but we were — to give the writers credit — we didn't necessarily know if we were coming back or not. I think there's some really good things to the finale. I really liked the idea that they were hinting at Andi, Missy Peregrym's character, that she was going to probably be a reaper in the next season. I thought there was some really good stuff. At the same time, we weren't able to necessarily answer a lot of questions that we probably wanted to.

TVGuide.com: What questions did you want answered?
Labine: I always wanted to know, especially by the time we got to the finale, how much Ben and Sock were going to fit into the whole reaping thing, and whether we would ever get to meet the devil, and work with the devil... and also at the end of the finale I really liked the idea that they opened up the whole heaven-and-hell aspect, and that Michael Ian Black was going to basically become Bret's guardian angel. I thought that could have been really cool, if they'd blown that out on a massive scale, made it more of a heaven-versus-hell storyline. But we'll never know.

TVGuide.com: We get asked a lot about Tyler's new show, Sons of Tucson. How's that going?
Labine: Great — the pilot turned out really, really well. Fox is really behind it. They've put us in an amazing timeslot after The Simpsons and before Family Guy, which is great, on their Sunday night Animation Domination bloc. We're clearly not an animated show, but whatever. I will be very, very animated on the show — like watching a Linklater film. We've been picked up for a midseason order, which is great too. ... We've got a really good show on our hands. It's a great character. It's not Sock, which is sad now, because I'm just mourning the death of Sock, but it's great to not be playing the same character.

TVGuide.com: And Bret, what's next for you?
Harrison: I'm doing reshoots on a movie I shot about six months ago called Mardi Gras for Sony Screen Gems and I'm just doing some development stuff, working with a few different writers on some projects. We're going to go into NBC and pitch after the end of the month.

TVGuide.com: This show was a big breakthrough for all the major characters except Ray Wise. How did it change your lives?
Labine: It was not a breakthrough for Ray, but it was a nice resurgence for Ray.

Harrison: Ray got a lot of love for this show. He should have gotten an Emmy. ... I mean, that said, it was great for all our careers. It was really cool for me because I was always kind of looked at as a half-hour guy. I would go into meetings and it was like, "Well, you know. You're a half-hour guy. You're a sitcom guy." ... This was a chance for me to do something different, and still there was a lot of comedy in it.

Labine: For me, I was kind of the king of the dipsh--s for failed hour-long shows. I'd been on a bit of a warpath with hour-long shows. ... You never know what show is going to hit people the right way and what show is the one that's going to open doors for you. But I'd been sort of working away for a long time in hour-long and honestly didn't know — I think a lot of us signed on to do the pilot because the script was good and Kevin Smith was attached. I'll do anything with Kevin. We shot the pilot, and lo and behold it was the one that did end up opening doors. I owe a lot to Reaper for letting me showcase things that a lot of other people wouldn't.

Mew. I will miss Ben most of all. How come he didn't get interviewed?! He's the BEST!

TV Tidbits 53 - Reaper, CBS Bubbles

I don't think anyone else watches Reaper but Robert loves Sock so I have to post this interview with him from TVGuide.com. Sorry.

Reaper's returned and it's looking to harvest more laughs — at the expense of Sock (Tyler Labine). The wisecracking sidekick is back for a lot more action this time around that doesn't exactly include demon-hunting. What does it include? Him, his sister-in-law, a steamy shower and a whole lot more. See what else Labine has to say about the scandalous new season, his apparent new "addiction" and why Reaper (Tuesdays at 8 pm/ET, the CW) is better than Lost. Wait, what?

TVGuide.com: You have a few new faces this season.
Tyler Labine: We do. We got bunch of people to liven up the show and they really did: Sean Patrick Thomas, Jenny Wade. We have Army Hammer. I think he's the heir to the Arm & Hammer throne — I'm not even kidding! Eriko Tamura played my [stepsister].

TVGuide.com: And you have a thing for her.
Labine: [Laughs] Oh yeah! I'm not gonna say too much, but she's extremely attractive. I meet her one day and she comes and lives with me and one thing leads to another. It's pretty risqué. There's some almost-nudity.

TVGuide.com: But you're on at 8 pm now. It can't be too much.
Labine: It's about as far as we can go with the show without Standards & Practices stepping in. I've got a couple of three-quarters nude scenes. [Laughs] There's a shower scene. They're good. They're hot — steamy.

TVGuide.com: Were you nervous at all shooting them?
Labine: No, no, no. I'm very comfortable with my body. I just shot a movie last year where I actually f--- computers in the movie, so I got pretty comfortable walking around in a banana hammock.

TVGuide.com: So there's a lotta sex going on this season?
Labine: It is dripping with sex. That's the idea. [Laughs] I will say that any sexual content was strictly for comedic purposes. It wasn't trying to, like, flash it up or make it seem more "tween-y." It's, like, Sock's naked — that's funny.

TVGuide.com: Does Sock realize it's not OK to go after his stepsister?
Labine: It starts out very taboo, I guess. I have some slightly internal struggles, but they end up being very external. [Laughs] At one point, I actually consider chemical castration so that I would stop lusting after my own sister. After I exhaust all my options, we make it happen. And it's beautiful! We actually forge a pretty neat relationship and I end up trying to seek the approval of her father, aka my new stepdad, so it gets a little weird there too. He's, like, a strict, staunch Japanese man.

TVGuide.com: That's a pretty big step for Sock to take. Is there gonna be some character development with him?
Labine: It's huge. It's definitely a lot of character development for him, but is very in the realm of Sock. It got to the point where last year I didn't know how much more ridiculous I could get with him and the writers had a very clear idea of how ridiculous they could get with me — and they took it there. I committed some things to film this year that I never thought you could do on a network television show.

TVGuide.com: What else is in store for him? Is he gonna help capture more souls?
Labine: Ben [Rick Gonzalez] and I help with a few here and there, but we have a pretty strong B-line and Sam [Bret Harrison] is busy doing stuff with Army Hammer, who is another son of the Devil, so they share a lot the demon-hunting responsibilities. We kinda broke out of the monster-a-week formula a little bit. Some weeks are just dealing with the mythology and the characters, which is cool.

TVGuide.com: The Season 1 finale ended with questions surrounding Sam's paternity. How much of that are we gonna explore?
Labine: Oh, a lot. There's the implication that Sam's dad is probably the devil and Sam's other dad looks to be a demon, so there's a lot of things left open that we picked up immediately. We also start thinking about the fact that Sam's mom had sex with the Devil. [Laughs] You know how shows pose questions and never answer them? I think we're not guilty of that. We answer all of them. Some don't. I'm a big Lost fan, but there are definitely things in the show that I'm convinced now are not coming back. Honestly, I don't even care anymore, but it's like, "There was a big thing you left unanswered there." It is kind of a pet peeve of mine.

TVGuide.com: Do you raise more questions in the Season 2 finale?
Labine: Definitely. It's a cliff-hanger, but it's not too big of a cliff-hanger because we're on the bubble and you don't wanna leave your audience hanging. It's a cleverly posed scenario at the end that kind of wraps up Season 2, but it leaves you with a whole new path and mythology that almost directly relates to [demon lovers] Steve and Tony. If we come back, we can move into it and if it doesn't, hopefully people will be satisfied.

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It looks like CBS mainstays Without a Trace and Cold Case are now officially 'on the bubble.' According to Ausiello:

"Multiple sources confirm that cost-conscious CBS has informed the producers of Without a Trace and Cold Case that the long-running procedurals are facing possible cancellation come May.

"They no longer have the type of ratings that justify the massive overhead," points out an Eye source, who adds that the Trace and Case bean counters at Warner Bros. are looking for ways to trim costs and avoid getting the axe. That includes convincing the casts of both shows to take salary cuts -- or at the very least forfeit their annual raises. (As I reported last month, CBS is implementing a similar salary freeze at most of its in-house dramas.)

But even if new figures can be negotiated, the insider stresses that "it's not a given that either show will be back." Reps for CBS and Warner Bros. declined to comment for this story."

This surprises me. CBS always seem to have shows that no one talks about - JAG, NCIS, The Mentalist - but are surprisingly heavily watched. Both Trace and Case have been around for years and sort of seemed like the kind of sturdy (if slightly dull) shows that make CBS run. Robert and I gave up on Trace when icky Elena came on but we've been watching Cold Case for a few years and we like it. We don't love it but it's a good, steady show that has a fulfilling conclusion each week. (I am old - I totally like self-contained episodes as opposed to those that address a show's overarching story/mythology. Are you listening, Reaper?! Didn't think so. Some of the best episodes of The X-Files were "monster-of-the-week" stories - "Je Souhaite," "Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose," "Humbug"... but I digress.) Apparently, us unexciting folk are in the minority. Whatevs.

TV Tidbits 51 - Reaper, Amazing Race

I know - I could've glumped 51's info into 50 but I felt like Life on Mars' demise deserved its own post. Sorry.

In any event, here are a couple more blurbs I found on TVGuide.com: (1) an interview with Reaper's Ray Wise (Reaper's 2nd season premieres tonight, by the way); and (2) an interview with the losers from Sunday's Race.

(1.) Ray Wise has a legendary gift for diabolical roles — he played the character, after all, who committed perhaps the most famous murder in television history. Wise is marking his 40th year since his first film — Dare the Devil — by continuing his turn as The Devil himself in the second season of the CW's Reaper.

Wise, whose other memorable roles include the vice president on 24, talked to us about The Devil's plan for his son, Sam, and how he learned the fate of Twin Peaks' Laura Palmer. (If you've never seen Twin Peaks, skip the last two questions and go watch the DVDs right now. It is, in the opinion of your humble interviewer, the best television show that has ever aired.)

TVGuide.com: You play The Devil like he's having a lot of fun. Is recapturing souls a high-stakes thing for him, or is he just having a blast?
Ray Wise: I think it's just kind of a blast, yeah. I think he really enjoys mixing it up here on Earth with human beings. ... And the more chaos he can cause while enjoying it, the better he likes it.

TVGuide.com: At one point this season, Sam tries to hang out with him as a buddy and he seems a little shaken up. Why is that?
Wise: Well, I don't know that he's that shaken up... I think he has a plan for Sam and that he wants the relationship to develop in a certain way. And so, if Sam tries to step outside the devil's plan at any one moment in time, he wants to rein him back in.

TVGuide: Does he want Sam to take over the family business at some point?
Wise: [Laughs] I think that that's quite possible, yes.

TVGuide.com: One of the little twists this season is that Sean Patrick Thomas' character has figured out a way to escape The Devil.
Wise: I think it would be safe to say that you really can't escape The Devil. So what you should do is try not to go his way.

TVGuide.com: On Twin Peaks, your character, Leland Palmer, killed his daughter. On Reaper, Sam thinks maybe The Devil is out to kill him. Are your kids a little freaked out?
Wise: [Laughs.] Nah, it doesn't bother them at all. They were pretty young when Twin Peaks was on, so they've just been catching the tail end of that phenomenon. ... But they are enjoying the fact that I'm playing The Devil.

TVGuide.com: When you were making Twin Peaks, when did David Lynch tell you that your character killed Laura?
Wise: I didn't find out until a day before we shot those scenes, where I was revealed. It was a hush-hush big secret. ... When he told me, it was me in a dark room we were all sitting cross-legged on the floor with a lava lamp in the corner. It was me and Sheryl Lee and Richard Beymer and Mark Frost and David Lynch and he leaned over and he touched me on the knee and he said, "Ray, it's you. It was always you."

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(2.) It was gypsies, vamps and a really bad flight on Sunday's Race that saw married couple Brad and Victoria Hunt eliminated. The duo opted for an earlier flight to Bucharest, Romania with a connection through Amsterdam — which would've worked out well if they hadn't missed the connection. Was the slim, 15-minute advantage they would've gotten worth the risk? They think so. Find out what else the couple had to say about their unlucky fate, why the leg was still the best part of the Race for them and what new challenges they're currently facing.

TVGuide.com: I was so sad to see you two go. I thought you were going to go far.
Victoria: Oh, thank you! We were very sad too. [Laughs]

TVGuide.com: So the big question is: Why did you decide to take that flight?
Brad: It's kind of a long story. In the first leg we had gotten some information about how to get to the Church of San Antonio by talking to some tourists — info that other teams didn't have. As soon as we got off the train, the other teams followed us and from there shouted the name and got there before us. Typically the rationale for not getting on a plane with another team is you've got at least one team you can beat in a foot race to the finish. Once we saw that happen with the church and with Linda and Steve gone, there was no team there that we would want to get in a foot race to the finish. So we knew we needed to a) get away from the group so when we got some info, they couldn't follow us and use our info and b) it was pointless to drag another team along with us because any of them could beat us. Even though it was only a 15-minute advantage, it would've still been enough to get us away from the rest of the group, where we could get info on our own.

The second thing is, until we got to the departure lounge, we weren't sure if there were gonna be other teams sitting there. You try to get the earliest flight you can and we'd feel pretty stupid to decline a flight that would leave 15 minutes earlier. There's no one at the departure lounge, so we thought whatever, we'll work it out. Then they said there was gonna be fog and the gate agent assured us the planes in Amsterdam would be delayed even more so we'd make the connection.
Victoria: They were all very encouraging. If they weren't, we might've made a quick decision that moment to drop that plan and try to get another flight. It's hard to explain to people unless you're right there in the moment making those decisions. It's hard to convey to people how you rationalize each decision along the way. We've heard people's opinions. "Oh, you should've known better! Never get on a plane without another team. Never take a flight with a connection." We know! But until you're there, it's kind of hard.
Brad: Every stupid thing I've done in my life seemed like a good idea at the time.

TVGuide.com: You can blame the gate agent.
Victoria: Exactly right! [Laughs]

TVGuide.com: How delayed were you guys?
Victoria: We think that set us back a whopping 18 hours.
Brad: We missed the plane by a minute. Our plane from Munich landed at the exact same minute as the plane from Amsterdam left. Even when the plane landed, they couldn't tell us absolutely for sure that we had missed it.
Victoria: It was so close! So close! And we didn't know what was going on. We didn't know what the other teams were doing. When we got up the next day, we were like fiends, racing through the challenges. We made good decisions. We were skilled. We got a good cab driver. We really nailed that day. We would've been the team to beat if we had been able to do it 18 hours earlier. [Laughs]

TVGuide.com: What did you do in the airport?
Brad: Oh, they put us up in the nicest Holiday Inn in the world! It was literally the nicest. It was first class. You'd never know it was a Holiday Inn. We made the mistake of wishing we'd be somewhere to see the Election Night returns come in because that was Election Day and we were thinking maybe an airport bar. Little did we know, we got a really nice hotel room. [Laughs]

TVGuide.com: You two finished in the dark. Do you know how far behind Tammy and Victor you were?
Brad: We were told six hours.
Victoria: We could've beaten them.
Brad: We ran the leg fastest out of anyone aside from the plane ride.

TVGuide.com: Did anyone tell you that Tammy and Victor got lost on the Detour and messed up badly when you got there, or did you find out last night?
Brad: We didn't know until the next team arrived at Elimination Station. The first thing they asked was, "What happened to you guys?" They don't tell you what happens to teams behind you; they just disappear. We had heard a little bit about what they had done, but without seeing it, we didn't really realize how badly they screwed up. I think, watching it last night, we were like, "God, they're not invincible! We could've gotten them!" [Laughs]

TVGuide.com: You said on the show you were holding out hope that maybe someone else screwed up worse than you two did. Was it hard to find the positive side, knowing you were so far behind?
Victoria: We were in very high spirits and it was a very fun, playful day. I don't think for even a moment I allowed thought of failure to enter my mind. I supposed, intellectually, I was prepared, but until we actually stepped foot on the mat and Phil told us, we still naively believed that it was possible somebody else might've screwed up as bad as we did or maybe it was a non-elimination leg.
Brad: Victoria and I have faced a lot of challenges in our lives and some challenges together. Whenever you face a challenge, it's not the time to second-guess and get involved with negative thinking. We both kinda agreed the last leg, racing from Amsterdam to Transylvania, was the best part of the Race for us. Everything just clicked and it was bam, bam, bam.

TVGuide.com: We hardly saw you doing anything, though. They showed you for not even10 seconds for the Roadblock and the Detour.
Brad: If we had a big, freak-out meltdown, we would've gotten all kinds of airtime. We were pretty much no drama. But the 10 seconds they showed, we're just kinda smiling. We didn't get a lot of airtime on the show because pretty boring TV is, like, yeah, no drama. [Laughs]
Victoria: I don't think we're boring. I don't think our fans think we're boring. We're fun, happy people and we get along really well, and I think people like to see that once in a while.

TVGuide.com: What are you up to now?
Brad: Well, some things. Victoria hurt her hip on the run down the mountain [in the second episode]. It pretty much crippled her, so she's gonna be faced with some surgery in June. And two weeks before the premiere, I was diagnosed with cancer, so I got a little challenge ahead of me.
Victoria: We came away with some issues. [Laughs]
Brad: We have a few things on our plate before we think about our where our next worldwide travel adventure is going to be.

TV Tidbits 45 - Reaper, Medium

I know, it's not Wednesday but I came across a few blurbs on TVGuide.com and figured it wouldn't hurt to pass'em along.

1. A cute Q&A with Medium's Jake Weber and Patricia Arquette:

Medium returned for its fifth season [last night] with an appropriately ghostly murder mystery featuring guest star Max Casella (The Sopranos) as a mysterious suitor who goes to great lengths for true love. Future episodes will mark a shift in how Allison "sees" things (look for a True Blood star to cameo), as the line between the corporeal and ethereal worlds is blurred. On the homefront, Joe's got a sweet new job, Ariel's teen years are ready to rear their ugly head and Bridgette is drawing naked pictures in art class. TVGuide.com listened in as Arquette and her TV hubby bickered like a real married couple, along the way teaching us the difference between a psychic and a medium, how they keep the show — and their TV marriage — fresh, and who their dream cast would include.

TVGuide.com: There are a lot of psychics —real and fake — on TV these days. What's the difference between a psychic and a medium?
Patricia Arquette: I think they're the same thing actually. But, you know, for some reason Allison DuBois, the real Allison, didn't like the word psychic; it conjured for her images of people who were taking advantage of people and some kind of hippy thing. And she wasn't like that, like crystals and incense.

TVGuide.com: Going into your fifth season, how do you keep the show fresh?
Arquette: I've taken to pinching and hitting Jake. That helps me. Like, I stomp on his toes right before we roll or pinch him hard or something like that; that helps.
Jake Weber: Yeah, it's just like going home now. It's been five years and I think that Patricia and I see more of each other than we do our own families. I think one of the advantages of doing a show for as long as we have and working with the same people as long as we have is you just don't get nervous anymore. It's all sort of relaxed and you just want to have a good time at work.
Arquette: You have a lot of directors who come and go, but because you're consistently working with each other and the crew, you have a very safe place to go, "Did that suck? What do you think? Do you think I got there? Should we go again?"
Weber: You've never asked me that.
Arquette: I have too.
Weber: Never in five years.
Arquette: Because you're not reading my mind. [Laughs]

TVGuide.com: Things in the DuBois household seem to be getting back to normal with both parents back to work. How long do you think that's going to last?
Weber: I don't know. It was so dark for a couple of years, which I kind of love, but I think it's good to give them a little bit of relief. They're still in the same spot that the country is in, but they have a light at the end of the tunnel. It's nice to give them a little bit of happiness.
Arquette: The sad reality is that crime is good business during times like these.

TVGuide.com: What makes Joe and Allison's marriage work?
Weber: I think they make each other laugh; they tease each other. I think that they fight hard but they make up very easily. I think there's an unspoken quality that all relationships: goodwill. A lot of times the actions that people take in a relationship indicate to you the lack of goodwill one partner has toward the other: "Hey, could you take out the trash?" "Sure."

TVGuide.com: At the SAG Awards, Meryl Streep spoke pretty forcefully about how many great roles there were for women this year. Within the context of your sister Rosanna's 2002 documentary Searching for Debra Winger [about the lack of roles for middle-aged actresses], do you think things have gotten better? How has your experience on Medium influenced that opinion?
Arquette: Well, I think television has long been a strong supporter of women in leads, from Lucille Ball on. The last couple of years have shown that there have been better roles, but I think Meryl Streep is at a little bit of an advantage. There are many great actresses will never get in the room for a Meryl Streep part. But I'm glad to see more actresses having more powerful parts to play.

TVGuide.com: If you look at the traditionally successful TV genres — crime, drama, medicine — right now there are a lot of those series that are led by women, whether it be Glenn Close on Damages or Grey's Anatomy...
Arquette: I think it's always great when there's good work out there, I guess, and I think it helps other actresses. The people that make decisions are bankers, and they look at models that are financially lucrative and then they make decisions on future projects according to a model they've seen make money [in the past]. So when someone goes in a room and pitches something as being "like The Closer," you know, look at how well The Closer has done for them.
Weber: Especially on television, it's not so much a patriarchy; it always seems that there's a smart, strong woman calling the shots and her doofus husband. In the sitcom world, it's almost a cliché that the women have the common sense, going back to The Honeymooners. Plus, I just think the writing is getting better. Television is getting much more complex. The writers ask for more of a commitment from their audiences. They don't really allow you to just check in once in a while; you have to follow these shows. I think that is working across the board in both men and women's favor.

TVGuide.com: Speaking of doofus husbands, Jake, what will Joe be up to this season?
Weber: Oh, Joe's in a good spot; he's got this investor who's putting up the dough for him to run his own company. And he's working in a big fancy warehouse. He has some problems finding people to work for him because he's had some bad luck with that. But he's in a good spot; he's in a big pot of honey this year.

TVGuide.com: Any favorite episodes or scenes so far this year?
Weber: I really liked [an episode that Arquette directed]. I thought it was a really good storyline. There were some directorial problems...
Arquette: You rat bastard.
Weber: She's got this weird fixation with food. She makes her actors eat food all the time.
Arquette: I do.
Weber: Every f---ing scene that I was in I had to be eating an apple or a piece of pizza or I don't know what else.
Arquette: You haven't even seen my cut yet, Jake, so just zip it.

TVGuide.com: Any interesting guest stars coming up?
Arquette: We have some great guest stars: Blythe Danner, David Morse, Tracy Pollan, James Van Der Beek, Amanda Detmer, Kevin Corrigan, my son Enzo Rossi and Kurtwood Smith.

TVGuide.com: Do you have any pie-in-the-sky guest-star casting fantasies?
Arquette: I've always wanted to explore Allison's relationship with her mom, which we've never seen. She alludes sometimes to how lonely she was in discovering her abilities and how she wants it to be different for her daughter. I was always hoping that we could get Gena Rowlands. That's one of my little private fantasies.
Weber: I have a fantasy...

TVGuide.com: Let's try to keep it to the casting fantasies, OK?
Weber: It involves Juliette Binoche as my new French assistant.

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2. Reaper is coming back earlier than expected:

[The CW] is bringing the devilish series back for its second season on March 3, a couple weeks earlier than originally planned, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The change will cause some shake-up in the CW's schedule. Reaper will now air at 8 pm/ET on Tuesdays, pushing 90210 back an hour, perhaps to help the teen drama avoid the ratings behemoth that is American Idol. Reaper's early return also means that Privileged's season finale will now air Feb. 24. The possibility of Privileged returning for a second season still hasn't been decided, so "keep your fingers crossed."

Reaper will air all of its 13 episodes without interruption, as originally planned.

Hmm. I think we're supposed to think this is a good thing - like the CW wants to bring back early to make people happy. Reading between the lines, it looks to me like the CW is bringing it back early to put it up against Idol and protect 90210 from the inevitable ratings crushing. Which means the CW is trying to kill Reaper. And that is not a good thing.

TV Tidbits 42 - Daisies, Office, Numbers, Reaper

Wow. Today's spoilers are pretty weak - which I guess is attributable to the upcoming holidays but still... I really had to scrape some stuff together for my Wednesday scoop report this morning!

Does Bryan Fuller's decision to rework Pushing Daisies' finale to have more closure mean that there is less of a chance that there will be a comic book continuation of the series?
Ausiello: No. Although closure will come to nearly all of Daisies' main characters in the final episode, Bryan still plans to keep the franchise alive in comic book form.

Any news on a possible return of Amy Ryan to The Office?
Ausiello: As luck would have it, my colleague, Adam Vary, just asked Ryan that exact question. Here's her response: "We don’t have plans for it, but, you know, there were niceties exchanged about wanting to. And then I don't know what one would write for that, because they belong together, but there has to be conflict. Someone's going to screw it up, I suppose."

Could you please give us some scoop on Numbers?
Ausiello: Yes, but only because you asked nicely. John Glover will reprise his role as psychic Samuel Kraft in episode 13 when mysterious deaths among Chinese immigrant women lead the FBI into a spooky web of conspiracy. And you'll never believe who penned the episode. No, not Chad Michael Murray...Peter MacNicol!

Any good spoilers for Reaper?
TIM: When Reaper returns to the CW on March 17, Sean Patrick Thomas (Save the Last Dance) makes his debut as Alan, a man who sold his soul to Ray Wise's Devil but figured out a way to renege — just as Sam dreams of doing. "Alan becomes the one-armed man for this season," series co-creator Michele Fazekas tells the Buzz. "Find him and figure out, how do you get out of your deal?"

TV Tidbits 28 - Chuck, Reaper, Amazing Race

Wednesday Ausiello gossip has been kind of "meh" the past couple weeks but I scraped up a couple tidbits for you:


CHUCK

• Chuck boss Josh Schwartz reveals in this week's episode of Ausiello TV that "a major character dies" in the Sept. 29 season premiere.

• Jordana Brewster will guest star in a multi-episode arc as Chuck’s college girlfriend Jill.
• Nicole Richie will pop up in an October ep as a gun-toting former Mean Girl/classmate of Chuck's CIA gal pal, Sarah Walker.
• Morgan Fairchild and Bruce "Scarecrow" Boxleitner have just been cast as the parents of Captain Awesome.
• Fairchild will play Dr. Honey Woodcombe. She arrives in time to take over help plan her son's wedding to Chuck’s sister, Ellie.
  
• Boxleitner will be her awesomely named husband, Dr. Woody Woodcombe, who is said to be very excited to help welcome Ellie into his family -- maybe too excited.

REAPER

• Armie Hammer (no relation to the baking soda [and yes, that's his real name]) is joining the cast as Morgan, Sam's half bro. Although it would seem he's only concerned with spending time at the hottest clubs and dating supermodels, Morgan is secretly jealous of Sam, and has a darker agenda which will prove to be dangerous to Sam and the gang.

AMAZING RACE

This isn't really a "scoop" but it's still entertaining. TWoP has posted an Amazing Race 13: Who Will Win? photo gallery handicapping each team. My favorite quote? " Why do people think that reality shows can solve their relationship problems? Have they not watched this show before?" So very true, recapper. So very true. There are 4 couples this season that will be using the Race to test the limits of (and hopefully solidify... hope away!) their relationship. How dumb ARE you? Robert and I love each other dearly but are keenly aware of just how much damage bickering nonstop for weeks on end while trying not to get lost or die would do to our relationship. We're smart like that.


And this is an 18-month-old article about season 2 of Top Chef that I guess I never read because I found one bit in particular both fascinating and enlightening:

The defining moment of the season came a few weeks ago when some of the remaining five competitors decided, after a night of drinking, to shave their own heads, and then shave Marcel's. At least, that's what viewers saw. After Ilan and Elia shaved their heads, Cliff woke Marcel, and as Ilan cheered him on, wrestled Marcel to the ground and held him in a headlock. As a result, Cliff was sent home for violating the show's rules.

That wasn't quite what happened, however. Careful viewers noticed that, in one of those scenes, Elia still had all of her hair, and was on the floor laughing as Marcel angrily stormed off. In other words, she and Ilan shaved their heads only after their attempted hazing of Marcel went awry. Editing the scene out of order seemed designed to protect the show's integrity, which was waning episode by episode as interpersonal conflict took over.

After the incident, the producers refused to allow head judge Colicchio to dismiss all four participants, like he wanted to do, and thus let Marcel win the competition by default. On his BravoTV.com blog, Tom wrote that "[p]roducers stepped in with a veto. Sending all of the chefs but Marcel home wasn't going to happen."

Of course, the departure of those four contestants would have prematurely ended the series on a low note. But it would have also been a fitting note, as the competition and cooking often fell away in favor of "Real World"-style immaturity and unnecessary drama packed with deceptive editing.

How did I miss this last year?!!! That is some great gossip in and of itself but the article is quite good, too. Dang!! I think sending all 3 home would've been awesome! Even more so because then whiny paella-making Ilan would never have won. I'm not a huge Tom fan - I think he's a bit too stern and cutting in his remarks from time to time - but making Elia, Cliff and Ilan pack up their knives and go was a fine idea on his part!! Stupid realiTV producers.

TV Tidbits 12 - Upfronts Day 2

• Reaper: Officially picked-up by the CW for a 2nd season
• It will return for 13 episodes midseason and will likely be paired with “Supernatural” on Thursday nights after “Smallville” concludes its run.
• Here's a Q&A with the show's producers on the upcoming season finale.
• Aliens in America: Not canceled?!
  
• TVGuide.com's Ausiello still has AIA listed as axed.
  
• However, both EW.com ("[Reaper] will join fellow sophomores Aliens in America and Gossip Girl on the net's slate for next year...") and MSNBC.com ("“Reaper,” along with “Aliens in America” and “Gossip Girl,” is part of CW’s sophomore slate of scripted programming. The buzz-heavy “Gossip Girl” received a quick pickup. The ratings for “Aliens” fell below the line, and few expected a renewal.") have stated that the show will be back for a 2nd season.
• Who is right?! I'm going to hope that it really is coming back and will be checking for Ausiello confirmation throughout the day...

----- ----- ----- ----- ----- -----

• ABC's fall lineup looks like:

• Pushing Daisies and Dirty Sexy Money will be back on Wednesdays, as will the hit series Private Practice, while Boston Legal will be back for its final season on Mondays.
• Grey's Anatomy will serve as a lead-in on Thursdays to Life on Mars, a new dramedy based on a BBC series of the same name that stars a present-day cop (Jason O'Mara) who's transported back in time after getting hit by a car.
  
• On Tuesdays, a new reality show called Opportunity Knocks will literally bring a game show to someone's front porch each week, and a new season of Scrubs (yep, that old NBC comedy) will follow Knocks once Dancing with the Stars finishes up its next installment.
  
• A new animated comedy from Mike Judge (King of the Hill) called Goode Family (about a clan compelled to do the right thing) and a new season of Eli Stone will round out Tuesdays.
• Sundays will remain intact with the winning lineup of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, Desperate Housewives, and Brothers & Sisters.
  
• Other shows set to return this fall include Samantha Who, Super Nanny, and Wife Swap.
  
• Lost will come back midseason, as will a new and yet untitled reality show from Ashton Kutcher and Tyra Banks, not to mention According to Jim, The Bachelor, and ABC News' "Primetime: What Would You Do?"
• And you already know that Men in Trees and October Road were canceled.

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• New Adventures of Old Christine: Renewed for a 22-episode 3rd season
• This, of course, means ABC is stuck, as they were pretty much banking on snagging Christine once CBS let her go...
• Moonlight: Canceled
• Though it had a rabid fan base (I guess the blood drive wasn't enough to save this vampire!), "the buzz is that the Eye simply was not happy with Moonlight's retention of its Ghost Whisperer lead-in. At last tally, Mick & Co. were letting slip some 13 percent of Melinda's audience."
• Shark: Canceled
• The Unit: Officially renewed
• Rules of Engagement: Renewed, will return mid-season
  

TV Tidbits 11 - Upfronts Day 1

The networks' upfronts start this week and updates on what shows are renewed or dead are coming in all the time! As such, I will update this post as I find things out and I'll bump it up to the top slot when I do. All scoopage is courtesy of TVGuide.com unless otherwise noted...

Fox was the first one up. Here's a mini-breakdown of what was renewed/canceled:

• Back to You: Canceled
• Rumor has it that "[T]hough the Grammer-Heaton sitcom drew good notices and decent numbers, it's reckoned that production costs ran too high (due to its marquee stars)."
• Til Death: Renewed for 3rd season
• The Inn: New series pick-up
• Described as "Upstairs/Downstairs at a hip New York hotel." The pilot was directed by Jason Bateman, and the cast includes Niecy Nash (Reno 911), Jerry O'Connell, Molly Stanton and Jesse Tyler Ferguson.
• New Amsterdam: Canceled

I also came across a couple tidbits re: two CW shows -

• Reaper: According to Ausiello, "I'm told it's "90 percent likely" that it'll be on the network's fall sked. " [That's awesome, though it does surprise me a bit. It's been on the bubble for a while now... but, it is a cute show and I hope it really does survive into the fall.]
• Aliens in America: Canceled!!!
  
• I guess it's not technically 'official' since the CW hasn't yet had their upfront but, again, according to Ausiello, "I just got the unofficial official word that one of this season's best new comedies has been axed. Despite rave reviews when it debuted last fall, the CW laffer went largely ignored by viewers. Which sucks for them, because they missed out on a fantastic little show."

WTF?! Aliens is a funny show! I mean, it's not the most hilarious thing I've ever seen but it was a nice little show that made me laugh and I enjoyed it every week. Crap!!! I'm bummed. :o( Here's one of my favorite clips from the show (skip to the 2:15 mark if you're in a hurry!):

"I trick them into believing I am M. Night Shyamalan"... hee!!! Raja is too cute. Mew.

UPDATE 1:

• Eli Stone: Renewed for 2nd season
  
• October Road: Canceled
• The Unit: Expected to return
• CBS may put it on Fridays @ 9. What does that mean for Moonlight? Dunno.
• HIMYM: Shoo-in for 4th season renewal
• Boston Legal: Renewed
• Terminator: TSCC: Renewed
  

TV Tidbits 10 - Reaper

Robert and I really like Reaper - which of course means it's probably going to be canceled. Actually, I guess no one yet knows if that's really the case, including the stars themselves. I think Bret Harrison is a cutie - he was very sweet on Grounded For Life and while I couldn't stomach The Loop, I hear he was pretty good on that, too. I hope he's not turning into Ted McGinley... the harbinger of death for any series!

Reaper fans have been having a devil of a time these past few weeks. At long last, the show returned from the writers' strike with episodes that took the supernatural action comedy to new peaks of creativity, even while the freshman series remained conspicuously absent from the list of programs the CW has renewed for next season. Star Bret Harrison (pictured), who plays retail peon/bounty hunter for hell Sam Oliver, phoned me today from Los Angeles to plug the season finale (airing May 20), which he promises will be full of answers to questions the show has been posing all season, and to urge fans cross their fingers that the CW will renew the series. (In fact, they can do more than that. In honor of sidekick Sock, played by Tyler Labine, some fans have joined in a Jericho-like campaign to send their socks to the CW's Burbank office to demonstrate their support. Harrison has a post on his website, Krakoom.com, showing solidarity with the sock-senders.)

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Do you have any indication whether or not the CW will pick up the show?
Bret Harrison: I have no idea. I think they're going to let us know Tuesday morning or something. [Tuesday, May 13, is the day the CW announces its fall slate at its upfront presentation to advertisers.] We just finished shooting the last scene on Monday. It's really hard to say goodbye to the whole cast and crew when it's "Bye... maybe?" It's a weird emotion.

Assuming there is a second season, what would you like to see happen on the show?
What they've been doing these last five episodes is what I hope they'd keep continuing. It's what we always wanted to do. It's the show we pitched. For a while, it went down this whole path of hammering the premise home because of new viewers. I was like, "What about the viewers we always had?" I don't know if it was the strike or what, but finally, the writers got a chance to do what they always wanted: the mythology, the Ken Marino-Michael Ian Black story [about the gay couple, Sam's neighbors, who were also demons plotting a rebellion against Satan], Sam being chased by demons and not just souls, and trying to find a way to take down the Devil. The big question is: Is the Devil Sam's father or not?

Do you think Sam is the Devil's son?
I really have no idea. I kind of think so. I'm thinking hybrid.

Like a Prius.
Yes.

Fans have been divided on whether Sam and his love interest, Andi (Missy Peregrym), got together too quickly, whether it was too soon for him to reveal to her that he hunts down escaped souls from hell, and for her to join the soul-busting gang that includes Sam, Sock, and Ben (Rick Gonzalez).
I think it's awesome. My vote is just to let it all out. You go for it, you don't hold back on too much of anything. I think its really cool that she's part of the gang. There certainly won't be any less drama. I'm sure Sam will run into some hot demon that will tempt our relationship.

I had a theory early on that the reason the Devil was keeping Sam and Andi apart was that she had some supernatural secret of her own. Does she have any surprises like that in store for us?
Hopefully some of those questions have been answered. If we just throw these two characters together in scenes were there's action, it'll be inevitable for stuff to come out that way.

There are some other lingering questions, such as, What was on the page of the contract for Sam's soul that his dad tossed into the fire?
They kind of answer that in the finale episode. A lot is coming out in the finale episode.

Are we ever going to see Cady (Sam's earlier girlfriend, who may have been the Devil's daughter) again? I'm guessing not, since Jessica Stroup got cast in that 90210 spinoff.
Probably not.

The show is so funny; how do you guys manage to keep a straight face?
We don't. A week and a half ago, we were shooting a whole sequence where Sam has to be on Sock's shoulders while he's making out with this succubus. And I'm attached to these wires that are attached to a truck so I can take some of the weight off Tyler's shoulders. That was the best day. He'd bail out, and I'd go flying behind the truck and whack the truck a few times. It was a very fun day. I feel like I have the best job in the world. I'm laughing all day every day.