News Shotgun 5/23
- What We Do in the Shadows Renewed for Season 3: FX has renewed what is easily one of the funniest shows on TV, What We Do in the Shadows, for a third season. Thanks to FX on Hulu, the show is up 25% in viewers from last season, drawing an average of 3.2 million viewers across broadcast and digital platforms. The current season wraps up on June 10th.
- Prodigal Son renewed for Season 2: Fox has renewed their freshman serial killer drama Prodigal Son for a second season. The show was the second most-watched new series behind 911: Lone Star. The second season will most likely air sometime next year during mid-season, as Fox’s strategy for the fall is filling their schedule with shows that have already been filmed, come from other networks or are Covid-19 proof, like their animated line-up.
- ABC cancelations and renewals: ABC also got into the renewal/cancelation game by revealing the fate of their entire slate. American Housewife, The Bachelor, black-ish, The Conners, Dancing with the Stars, The Goldbergs, A Million Little Things, mixed-ish, The Rookie, Shark Tank, Stumptown, 20/20 and Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, America’s Funniest Home Videos, American Idol, The Bachelorette, The Good Doctor, Grey’s Anatomy, and Station 19 are all renewed while Schooled, Emergence, Single Parents, Bless this Mess and Kids Say the Darndest Things are all canceled.
- Scott Pilgrim vs The World coming back to theaters: Celebrating its 10th anniversary this year in August, Scott Pilgrim vs The World is coming back to theaters according to Edgar Wright. Wright tweeted out that Dolby Cinemas and Universal are working together to bring the cult classic back to theaters in August (hopefully they will be back open by then).
- Esai Morales joins MI 7 and 8: Esai Morales, most recently seen as Deathstroke in Titans, has joined Mission Impossible 7 & 8, replacing Nicholas Hoult as the villain taking on Ethan Hunt and the team. Hoult had to drop off due to scheduling conflicts and the movies are currently on hold due to Covid-19 but MI 7 has a November 2021 release date.
- Jason Momoa and Peter Dinklage teaming for action/horror movie: Game of Thrones co-stars Jason Momoa and Peter Dinklage are teaming up for a new horror/action movie called Good Bad & Undead. Dinklage is playing Van Helsing, who teams with Momoa’s vampire character (who has vowed never to kill again) and they run a scam from town to town where Van Helsing gets rid of the vampire. Momoa’s character gets a bounty on his head and every supernatural creature in this world starts to come after the duo. The writers worked on the reboot of Friday the 13th and Freddy vs Jason.
- The Snyder Cut is coming to HBO Max: HBO Max launches next week and WB dropped a nuclear bomb of news this week to build hype: The Snyder Cut of Justice League is coming to the service next year. Mentioned incessantly by certain areas of the internet, the Snyder Cut was the long-rumored edit of Justice League before Zack Snyder had to leave due to a personal tragedy and Joss Whedon came in, re-shooting and re-editing the movie into what played in theaters. The Snyder Cut may be 4 hours long and could be broken into 6 “chapters” when it arrives on HBO Max. WB is also spending between $20-30 million to provide post-production, musical score and possible reshoots with actors to complete the cut in whatever current form it’s in. Characters like Darkseid, who was not in the theatrical version at all, will be in this new version and Snyder says that only “a fourth” of what he shot was actually in the movie, so this will be essentially an entirely new film.
- Halle Berry joins Moonfall: After a diversion to World War II last year with Midway, Roland Emmerich is heading back to his bread and butter, disaster movies, with his next movie Moonfall. The movie is about an asteroid colliding with the moon, sending it out of orbit and on a collision course with Earth. Josh Gad was previously cast and now Halle Berry has joined the cast this week as a former astronaut whose last mission may have a key to stopping the apocalyptic event. Production is hoped to start this fall.
- Ruby Rose leaves Batwoman: After a slightly abbreviated season to due Covid-19, the first season of Batwoman wrapped up after 20 episodes but almost immediately after the “season finale” aired last Sunday, star Ruby Rose announced she was leaving the show. It seems like there were lots of factors contributing, including Rose being unhappy with the long hours and production schedule, the massive amount of social media abuse she had gotten since she was cast and she also suffered a significant injury early in the production of the first season. The show is currently looking to cast a new lead, who will still be Kate Kane and not a new character taking on the cowl. The second season is expected to start airing in January next year along with the rest of the Arrowverse.
- Apple TV+ looking to shore up back catalog: Apple TV+ currently only has original shows and movies created by Apple but the company is apparently looking to work out deals with studios to gain back catalog movies and TV shows to fill out the service. It’s not clear who they could be working with, as studios like WB and Disney have their own streaming services, as does Universal soon with Peacock and Netflix, Amazon and Hulu also have deals with various studios.
- Greyhound debuting on Apple TV+: Speaking of Apple TV+, one movie that they have acquired is the upcoming WWII movie Greyhound starring Tom Hanks. The movie was originally going to be in theaters next month over Father’s Day weekend but it will now be exclusively on Apple TV+, although there is not a new release date yet.
- More details about Timothy Olyphant’s role in The Mandalorian: It was revealed last week that Timothy Olyphant was joining The Mandalorian next season and now there are more details, including the fact that Olyphant will be donning the iconic Boba Fett armor at some point. Olyphant is apparently playing a character named Cobb Vanth, established in the Star Wars Aftermath series of books. Vanth is a sheriff on Tatooine who purchases Mandalorian armor scavenged by Jawas near the wreckage of Jabba’s sail barge, which is assumed to be Boba Fett’s armor. Temura Morrison is returning to Star Wars to play Boba Fett in The Mandalorian, so it seems like there might a showdown between those two characters.
- Umbrella Academy Season 2 gets a release date: Season 2 of Netflix’s comic adaptation The Umbrella Academy is arriving on the streaming platform on July 31st. The first season was one of last year’s most popular Netflix releases.