Sunday, August 10, 2008

Sanctuary - SciFi Talk: Damian Kindler Audio Interview

From SciFi Talk:



Mon, 11 August 2008

Damian Kindler - Sanctuary Update

Catching up with Executive Producer Damian Kindler of the ground breaking series, Sanctuary now headed for the Sci-Fi Channel. We discuss the program's exciting new direction. Some great insights and a preview of the up coming season. Special thanks to Carole Appleby of Kayro Edelman. Music is by Victor Stellar.

Podcast link

John Scalzi - Tor Books: An Irreverent Q&A with John Scalzi and Tobias Buckell

From Tor Books:

(Please follow the link for the complete article.)

Ohio Authors Coming To Kick Your Butt with Science Fiction: An Irreverent Q&A with John Scalzi and Tobias Buckell

Did you miss the announcement? Ohio denizens and authors John Scalzi and Tobias Buckell are coming to kick your butts with Science Fiction this August 19th with their respective new novels, Zoe’s Tale and Sly Mongoose.

Check out there dynamic duo events in both Ohio and, ahem, “greater Ohio,” here.

Q: So, you’re both from Ohio! What’s so great about Ohio?
Tobias Buckell: The fact that, of late, it's become a literary hotbed of science fiction novelists... err, well, at least a handful of science fiction novelists. Certainly more than Montana. Technically I guess I'd have to admit under oath that I'm not from Ohio, but the Caribbean, which is why Caribbean themes and people are featured so much more heavily in my books than, say, things from Ohio.

John Scalzi: Toby notes he's an implant to Ohio, as am I: I actually grew up in Southern California, and moved to Ohio in 2001, so my wife could be closer to her family. That said, I actually do like it here; It's pleasant, it's relatively inexpensive to live here, and I live in rustic splendor in a little town with Amish folk. What's not to like? And certainly when I go back to LA and get stuck on the 405 I am reminded that I don't really miss that part of the California lifestyle. If only Ohio had In-N-Out burger, everything would be perfect...


Zoe’s Tale (0-7653-1698-6; $24.95) by John Scalzi and Sly Mongoose (0-7653-1920-9; $25.95) by Tobias Buckell release from Tor this August 2008.



Star Wars: The Clone Wars - SciFi Weekly: George Lucas Interview

From the SciFi Channel's SciFi Weekly:

(Please follow the link for the complete SciFi Weekly interview.)



August 11, 2008

Mr. Star Wars himself, George Lucas (and company) pulls back the curtain on animating a sci-fi epic

By Patrick Lee

Star Wars: The Clone Wars arrives in late summer, the latest feature-film installment in George Lucas' epic space saga. But it's different: computer-animated, voiced mainly by unknown actors and directed by animator Dave Filoni (Avatar: The Last Airbender). And it appears to be aimed squarely at kids.

Clone Wars—which is an expansion of the series of 2-D animated interstitials that ran in 2003 on the Cartoon Network—actually started life as the first installment of Lucas' upcoming CG TV series of the same name. But Lucas, who acts as executive producer, liked the result so much he decided to turn it into a feature film.

The movie, set in the time period between Lucas' Star Wars: Episode II—Attack of the Clones and Episode III—Revenge of the Sith, brings back familiar characters such as Anakin Skywalker (voiced by Matt Lanter) and Obi-Wan Kenobi (James Arnold Taylor). But it centers on a host of new ones, including Anakin's heretofore unknown padawan learner Ahsoka Tano (Ashley Eckstein) and the dark sorceress Asajj Ventress (Nika Futterman), who is known to fans of the Star Wars comics and books, as well as a new member of the Hutt clan, whose voice sounds oddly familiar.

Lucas, Filoni and producer Catherine Winder spoke with reporters recently at Lucasfilm Animation's headquarters, Big Rock Ranch in Marin County, Calif. The Clone Wars opens Aug. 15.

The Star Wars saga has always been steeped in mythology and Jungian archetypes. What sort of mythological territory will the Clone Wars TV series and the proposed live-action Star Wars series deal with?
Lucas: The mythological arc of the saga doesn't really continue into these other things, because that is a story. It has a beginning, a middle and an end. It's a story of one man's struggle against evil and the redemption by his son and that sort of thing.

This is ... more episodic. It's more like Indiana Jones, actually. ... You have themes and things that still go through it, and there are things like that, but [myth is not] not what it's based on. This is bigger, and we get to more places. And the fun thing about animation, especially, and The Clone Wars in particular, is that we're allowed to go and do stories about clones, get to know them, and find out what they do for recreation, and what Jabba the Hutt's family is all about, and, you know, do all kinds of things that don't have anything to do with the main character. The [live-action Star Wars] series itself, the epic, is basically about one man, so it's very, very narrow, and you pass through a lot of things and you look at "What's that over there?" but you never got to look at it. So this allows us to go and look at all of that stuff. Which means we're not encumbered by this mythological uberstory of the psychological underpinnings of why somebody turns to be a bad person.


Stargate SG-1 - 6pm Weekday Rotation Episodes week Aug 11

From the SciFi Channel's schedulebot, the Stargate SG-1 6pm weekday rotation episodes for the week of August 11 '08:

8/11/2008 MOEBIUS - PART 1



8/12/2008 MOEBIUS - PART 2



8/13/2008 AVALON - PT 1



8/14/2008 AVALON - PT 2



8/15/2008 ORIGIN



Photos courtesy of GateWorld

Stargate Atlantis - 5pm Weekday Rotation Episodes week Aug 11

From the SciFi Channel's schedulebot, the Stargate Atlantis 5pm weekday rotation episodes for the week of August 11, 2008:

8/11/2008 THE EYE



8/12/2008 THE DEFIANT ONE



8/13/2008 HOT ZONE



8/14/2008 SANCTUARY



8/15/2008 BEFORE I SLEEP



Photos courtesy of GateWorld

Stargate Atlantis - Fandemonium Books: Stargate Atlantis: Mirror Mirror

From a Fandemonium Books e-mail announcement:

Dear Stargate fan,

Our latest book is now available for order. It's called STARGATE ATLANTIS: Mirror Mirror.



Mirror Mirror
follows the Atlantis team as they struggle to hold the galaxy together - literally. With everything falling to pieces, can the team members return to their own realities before it's too late?

Mirror Mirror was written by Sabine C. Bauer, author of previous Stargate novels: STARGATE SG-1: Trial by Fire and STARGATE SG-1: Survival of the Fittest.

For more about Mirror Mirror, visit.

Sanctuary - Amanda Tapping at Sci Fi Night - St. Petersburg, FL

Amanda Tapping, Robin Dunne and Damian Kindler will be participating at Sci Fi Night on Saturday August 30 at the Tropicana Field Baseball Stadium (home of the Tampa Bay Rays), St. Petersburg, Fl.



Tickets for the event begin at $9 (the Sci Fi Night events are included with the purchase of a ticket for the baseball game), and also include a local band, 'We the Kings,' concert.

Tickets for all Rays home games are available at the Tropicana Field Box Office, Rays Tampa Office & Pro Shop, via the Rays official websites at http://www.raysbaseball.com or http://www.raysbeisbol.com, all Ticketmaster locations, and via Ticketmaster Phonecharge at (727) 898-7297 or (407) 839-3900.

The baseball game is the Tampa Bay Rays vs the Baltimore Orioles. The baseball game is scheduled to begin at 3:55pm, and the Sci Fi Night events follow the baseball game.

'Sanctuary' premieres on the SciFi Channel (US) on Friday, October 3rd at 9pm with a two-hour premiere episode.

Stargate SG-1 - Yahoo News: Isaac Hayes Dies

(Isaac Hayes portrayed the Jaffa Tolok in the SG1 episodes, 'Reckoning, Parts 1 & 2,' +'Threads,' and provided the voice over for the 'Teal'c, PI' segment in the episode, '200.')



Photo courtesy of GateWorld

From Yahoo News:

(Please follow the link for the complete Isaac Hayes' obituary.)

Hayes, 'Shaft' singer and disco presage, dies


MEMPHIS, Tenn. - Isaac Hayes, the baldheaded, baritone-voiced soul crooner who laid the groundwork for disco and whose "Theme From Shaft" won both Academy and Grammy awards, died Sunday afternoon after he collapsed near a treadmill, authorities said. He was 65.

Hayes was pronounced dead at Baptist East Hospital in Memphis an hour after he was found by a family member, the Shelby County Sheriff's Office said. The cause of death was not immediately known.

With his muscular build, shiny head and sunglasses, Hayes cut a striking figure at a time when most of his contemporaries were sporting Afros. His music, which came to be known as urban-contemporary, paved the way for disco as well as romantic crooners like Barry White.

And in his spoken-word introductions and interludes, Hayes was essentially rapping before there was rap. His career hit another high in 1997 when he became the voice of Chef, the sensible school cook and devoted ladies man on the animated TV show "South Park."

Hayes was about to begin work on a new album for Stax, the soul record label he helped build to legendary status. And he had recently finished work on a movie called "Soul Men" in which he played himself, starring Samuel Jackson and Bernie Mac, who died on Saturday.

Stargate: Continuum - MGM Stargate: Two NEW Stills Aug 10 '08

From MGM Stargate's Continuum photo gallery:

(Please follow the link for the photos in their original format.)



Dr. Daniel Jackson (Michael Shanks) in the Arctic




Col. Samantha Carter (Amanda Tapping) and Air Force F-15 jet

Stargate Atlantis - Video Archives: MGM Introduction to Stargate Atlantis

Digging into the old video archives, from 2004, a MGM Studios video featurette on the new TV series, 'Stargate: Atlantis.'

A new gate will open...

And a Lost City will rise...

Stargate Atlantis!

Includes micro-mini interviews with creator/writer/producer Brad Wright; actors Richard Dean Anderson, Joe Flanigan and Torri Higginson; and producer/director Martin Wood. Also includes brief clips from the premiere episode, 'Rising.'

The Dresden Files - Video: 'Storm Front'

Courtesy of HULU, The Dresden Files' 'Storm Front,' starring Paul Blackthorne, Valerie Cruz, Rebecca McFarland, Raoul Bhaneja, Conrad Coates, Joanne Kelly and Elizabeth Thai. Guest stars include Shannon Boodram, Greg Bryk, John DeSantis and Jonathan Whittaker.

When a local gangster and his girlfriend are found dead, the police assume that the gangster was the prime target, but Harry is convinced that the girlfriend is the key.