"V" on ABC this Fall (pics and video!)

[OldDude]

Originally Posted by ATX

oh shit

Juliet gone swallow whole rats.

I think she plays for the home team, not the visitors.

[buckee1]

Not gonna dismiss this one out of hand but, they'd have to do some serious writing to outdo the original. I already don't like the Visitor mothership re-design but, I'll give it a chance.

[scott1598]

been rewatching "V: The Original Miniseries" and "V: The FInal Battle" the past couple weeks. great stuff!

[ATX]

"scared to embrace change"

[DJariya]

In case you didn't hear, ABC moved up V from Midseason.

Will now premiere November 3rd

http://www.thefutoncritic.com/news.aspx?id=8247

LOS ANGELES (thefutoncritic.com) -- ABC is giving its "V" revival an early start: Tuesday, November 3 at 8:00/7:00c.

The announcement was made during the show's session at the TCA summer press tour - in unison no less - by co-stars Elizabeth Mitchell, Morris Chestnut, Joel Gretsch, Lourdes Benedicto, Morena Baccarin and Scott Wolf and executive producers Jeffrey Bell and Scott Peters.

[critterdvd]

Originally Posted by DJariya

In case you didn't hear, ABC moved up V from Midseason.

Will now premiere November 3rd

http://www.thefutoncritic.com/news.aspx?id=8247

This is good... right?

[Geofferson]

Glad to hear it.

[JuryDuty]

Originally Posted by critterdvd

This is good... right?

Apparently they had a very good response showing the pilot at ComicCon and feel its political pairings with today's headlines will help propel it (the Visitors promise hope, change and universal health care--no kidding!). Chances are that means they think it'll be one of their stronger shows and they want to get more out of it.

Here's a review from ComicCon:

Moody, weird, and genuinely scary, the premiere episode of new ABC series “V” has us convinced that there’s life after Battlestar Galactica. We saw the whole thing at Comic-Con and have a spoiler-free report.

Note: Despite the fact that he says it's spoiler-free, the next four paragraphs give away a lot of general happenings in the pilot so I'm spoilerizing them, even though I doubt they'd spoil anything for you:

Spoiler:

Based on an early-1980s miniseries, “V” is about what happens when dozens of gigantic alien ships arrive on Earth, hovering over major cities. A beautiful woman alien called Anna, played by Morena “Firefly” Baccarin, broadcasts the visitors’ messages from an enormous screen built into the bodies of the ships. She assures the people of Earth that the aliens want only to harvest chemicals from our waste products, which she says are valuable to them. In exchange, they’ll share technology with humans – especially medical technology, which they’ll set up in thousands of free clinics across the globe.

The only ones who doubt the good intentions of these preternaturally beautiful aliens are DHS agent Erica Evans and Catholic priest Jack Landry (played by 4400 alum Joel Gretsch). Erica and her partner Dale (the excellent Alan Tudyk) immediately start investigating them, and Jack gives a cautionary speech to his congregation about how humans should wait to judge the aliens by their acts rather than their words.

We see immediately that the aliens are masters of propaganda, using viral videos on YouTube to inspire teenagers (including Erica’s son Tyler) to spraypaint “V” on walls and giving slick TV interviews on the condition that no critical questions are asked. Chad Decker (Scott Wolf) plays a TV reporter who gets sucked into the aliens’ propaganda machine because he wants to score the ultimate interview with Anna – and caves when she says she’ll stop the interview if he asks probing questions. So at least in the first episode, the battle lines are drawn this way: DHS and church question the vistors; media-munching teens and reporters suck up to the visitors. Eventually, Tyler is drawn to join the youth outreach corps of the visitors, against the wishes of his mother.

Things heat up when Erica and Dale realize that the visitors seem to be connected with terrorist cells who are stockpiling C2 in massive amounts. It seems the visitors have been among humans for years, and we’re not sure what their goals are. We’re also introduced to some underground V-fighters via another main character, salaryman Morris Chestnut, who has some unexplained connections with these anti-V groups.

Especially in the first half, the premiere was gripping and eerie. The ships look great, and Morina Baccarin makes Anna incredibly menacing – mainly because she is always smiling so sweetly.

Created by Scott “The 4400″ Peters, the show clearly owes a lot to the original miniseries, especially in its depiction of how the alien “visitors” use the media – big media as well as virals online – to manipulate humans. But the original “V” dealt with themes of fascism, even including a Holocaust survivor character who comments on how the alien takeover reminds him of World War II. The reboot doesn’t touch on any of that. It’s explicitly about terrorism, and the aliens are actually referred to at one point as terrorists.

What this does, at least in the opening episode, is subtly shift the aliens from being superpowered, top-down authoritarians ala Hitler, to being diffuse, sleeper-cell style menaces who strike out from among the general population. This fits with the idea that the aliens hide their true, reptilian nature beneath human masks. But it also doesn’t quite work, because it seems obvious the visitors are so incredibly powerful that they shouldn’t need terrorist cells to take over the planet. They can just brandish their mega-ships and uber-technology to control all governments.

I think this problem is part of what makes the second half of the premiere episode a little choppy and confusing. A lot of plot developments happen really quickly and somewhat inexplicably, although you’ll be left wanting to see more. This is a pilot, after all, so some slapdashery can be forgiven in the service of setting up what looks like it will be an exciting, conspiracy-driven actioner. It’s also quite possible that we’ll find out why the visitors need to be sneaky. Maybe their powers aren’t quite as vast as they seem.

“V” drops with a 13-episode run, which means it will last longer than the two miniseries it’s based on. I’m looking forward to watching the plot unfold.

[critterdvd]

Okay... now I'm getting excited... Haha, thanks for the updates!

[wmansir]

My memory is kind of hazy but I think one of the things the original did right, at least in the beginning, was to portray the visitors as genuinely benevolent. The actors portrayed them sincerely, not as corporate pitchmen. They didn't include ominous music cues or obvious shifty glances between the visitors. It sounds like the remake is keeping that style, even if it might not be politically correct in Hollywood.

I'm also skeptical about the terrorism angle. If anything the human resistance in the original were more akin to terrorists. I haven't watched much Battle Star, but from what I read they went that route too, so maybe the V producers wanted to mix it up because of that.

[Luds]

Even if the remake sucks balls, I'm still gonna watch it. I'm a V fanboy.

[Red Dog]

That's a good sign for the show if ABC has enough confidence to premiere it at the start of sweeps.

and feel its political pairings with today's headlines will help propel it (the Visitors promise hope, change and universal health care--no kidding!).

I read about that in the WP article yesterday. That's awesome.

[Wolf359]

Sucky news for V.... Only four episodes until a months long break. Might as well just cancel it now.

http://blog.zap2it.com/frominsidethe...ll-spring.html


The aliens on "V" can't seem to compete with the less-puny humans in the Olympics.

ABC confirmed to the LA Times that "V" will premiere on Tuesday, Nov. 3 as scheduled, but after the first four installments are aired, it will go on hiatus.

Why? Well, there's the little thing called the Winter Olympics. ABC keeps touting the revamp of the '80s miniseries as an "event" and plans to relaunch sometime after the gold medals are handed out.

Of course, the buzz in Tinseltown hasn't been so sanguine since production on the show was previously shut down for a fortnight, a possible sign of creative rejiggering.

The first three episodes of the 13-episode order have been shot, with the fourth one shooting in mid-October. Then, hiatus. An official relaunch date has not been announced.

Follow Zap2it on Twitter for the latest TV, movie and celebrity news.

[Groucho]

Originally Posted by Wolf359

Sucky news for V.... Only four episodes until a months long break. Might as well just cancel it now.

Agreed, that's just ridiculous.

[critterdvd]

At this point they'd be better off just trying to turn them into 2 or 3 separate miniseries to air over the course of the season.

[Red Dog]

That sucks. It will be DOA.

[DJariya]

If they are having creative problems, they should work out the kinks 1st and save the show for 2010.

Plus, other than the Pilot, that story says they have only shot 2 episodes. Why the hell would they want to rush the premiere date if they are that far behind?

[Josh-da-man]

On the plus side, Morena has a nude scene in an upcoming movie:

NSFW:

http://www.egotastic.com/entertainment/celebrities/morena-baccarin/morena-baccarin-nude-video-from-death-in-love-004907

(Clips and caps from Egotastic.)

[albert_m]

Sucky news for V.... Only four episodes until a months long break. Might as well just cancel it now.

Yeah they think it's going to suck soooooo bad, that they are "throwing" it away every week of November sweeps.

[Deftones]

I read this and thought that was stupid. Long hiatus = death for shows.

[JuryDuty]

Crud, that's the last thing a show like this needs--especially as a sci-fi show on ABC. Sigh. Was fun while it lasted.

[ATX]

maybe they were gonna make it a miniseries like the og

maybe the show is trash, they made the intial 4 eps... watched it and gave themselves extra time to work on it (2010)

then some genius said since they already licenced the show lets put it in mid season and burn up these episodes

[fumanstan]

I've had the liberty of seeing the pilot thanks to a special screening at work; I've never seen the original (or even heard of it) but thought the concept was cool. I ended up enjoying the pilot quite a bit and looking forward to the rest of the show. I hope it's a success. There's some eye rolling parts involving the son, but the rest of it is pretty exciting with some decent effect work for a TV show.

[Wolf359]

Originally Posted by albert_m

Yeah they think it's going to suck soooooo bad, that they are "throwing" it away every week of November sweeps.

Uh....reading comprehension? I didn't say the show sucked, I said this news sucks. If you think airing only three our four episodes and then taking a three and a half month break will have no effect on the shows chances, you are deluding yourself.

[Luds]

Originally Posted by Wolf359

Sucky news for V.... Only four episodes until a months long break. Might as well just cancel it now.

http://blog.zap2it.com/frominsidethe...ll-spring.html


The aliens on "V" can't seem to compete with the less-puny humans in the Olympics.

ABC confirmed to the LA Times that "V" will premiere on Tuesday, Nov. 3 as scheduled, but after the first four installments are aired, it will go on hiatus.

Why? Well, there's the little thing called the Winter Olympics. ABC keeps touting the revamp of the '80s miniseries as an "event" and plans to relaunch sometime after the gold medals are handed out.

Of course, the buzz in Tinseltown hasn't been so sanguine since production on the show was previously shut down for a fortnight, a possible sign of creative rejiggering.

The first three episodes of the 13-episode order have been shot, with the fourth one shooting in mid-October. Then, hiatus. An official relaunch date has not been announced.

Follow Zap2it on Twitter for the latest TV, movie and celebrity news.

Wow. That makes perfect sense!