-47-

This week's post is going to be pretty much all about TV. Mainly because film news seem to have stopped flowing during Thanksgiving, but thank god TV never quits. The film industry did manage to attract viewers though, since the record for biggest Thanksgiving week box office revenue in US was broken, mainly because of Skyfall, Breaking Dawn part 2 and Lincoln.

From top left: How I Met Your Mother, Go On, The Simpsons, Arrested Development

FILM

With the catch line: "Every revolution begins with the spark", Hunger Games: Catching Fire has released a new interactive logo, much like they did with the first film. This is to get everybody excited and wait for the first trailer for the sequel for the smash hit. It won't be out until next November, but no reason not to get super duper excited! You'll find the logo here but beware of the sound effects that start as auto-play.

The movie This is 40 might not be a very strong candidate at the Oscars, but with this new Fiona Apple song, they are one of the hopefuls who try to get the coveted spot in the newly revised Best Original Song nomination list. This year there will be five nominations guaranteed, unlike last year where only two songs got enough votes to even get nominated. And as this years Oscar producers Neil Meron and Craig Zadan having a very strong background in musicals, we might even see full performances of all the songs on stage. You can listen to the Fiona Apple's song Dull Tool at Huffington Post.

Gotta love these idiots. The minions of Despicable Me are back with another teaser. Thanksgiving themed this time, it's short but worth watching! See it here.

I was glued to the screen watching these total of 22 minutes of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey -related video footage. First there is the 9th Production video which focuses on the post-production. I love these kind of featurettes where we get to see how the film actually gets its polished look. We get to see what happens at animation, editing, sound mixing etc. At the end of the video where we see Howard Shore recording the score, I got goosebumps when they started playing. The other video I'm talking about is a fan-made 8min video where he has edited most of the trailers together to create a mega-trailer. This is something you should not miss!!

I'll categorize this one as films, since my TV bit is going to be full. But here is the November patch of best entertainment photography from Vulture. Among them are such beauties as these. That's Laura Carmichael from Downton Abbey on the left and Alan Arkin with John Goodman on the right.

TV

I would be ashamed not to start with this. I feel like I'm responsible of about half of the 90k views of this video. The new promo video of Smash Season 2. We see a lot of old characters as well as newcomers. And of course the music, ah the music. So many good brand new songs! Check it out:

SNL might be losing another great player as Kenan Thompson is developing a new comedy (with Lorne Michaels producing). He plays a guy who moves back in with his parents at the suburbs. Of course this one is just in development, so NBC might not pick it up, though almost everything that has Lorne involved gets aired. But we'll see, I will surely miss Thompsons impressions of Whoopie Goldberg and Reba.

Though The Mindy Project is only on its first season, it is already going through some pretty big changes. Amanda Setton who plays Shauna is leaving the show due to creative differences. I think her character was funny for a while, but then they tried to make it too deep. Anna Camp, who plays Gwen has been bumped down to recurring character by her own demand so that she has more time to different projects. And not everyone are going, but Ellie Kamper is coming in for a guest appearance. She and Mindy co-starred of course in The Office for many years. Speaking of The Office. They released  this deleted Thanksgiving-themed scene, featuring a lot of funny moments, see it at EW.

I'm a bit torn, I have a lot of great videos to share, but I can't decide which ones to put here. This is such a "first world problem". I'll start with the I can most connect. Conan O'Brien visiting the Guinness Brewery at Dublin. It's fun to see places I've been to, and having Conan make fun of them makes it even better.

I haven't watched a full episode of The Dancing With The Stars US in my life, but I found this Paula Abdul performance to be pretty entertaining. I certainly I didn't know she could still move like that. Her performance used similar technology Beyonce used before, blurring the line what is the real performer and what is just video. If you don't focus on her lip-syncing, its very good.

Johnny Depp is making his Family Guy voice-over debut as he plays his old character Edward Scissorhands in an upcoming episode. The part is very small, but it continues the trend of big stars appearing in animated series. You can see the clip at EW. Another animated show is getting some star power, but in a totally different way. Some twenty years ago young Judd Apatow wrote a script for a very successful show called ... The Simpsons! The script is about Homer getting hypnotised and starts to think he is Bart's age. Sounds entertaining and hopefully it gets made during this season, because I don't know how long I can wait for this!

Though Cougar Town isn't back until January, they've released a brand new (wine-infused) promo. Featuring the whole gang throwing around some wine basically, but it sums up all the fun that makes Cougar Town. I tried to embed the video, but it didn't really work, so go to Deadline to watch it.

And let's not forget that this happened at Late Night with Jimmy Fallon:

TRAILERS

I don't want to fill this blog to much with videos (since it makes it a lot slower, not because they aren't great), so I'll just post two trailers this time. First one is for a fantasy epic Jack The Giant Slayer, which has had a bit rough road to production, but it is finally coming out. It won't be a huge success, I can tell it already, but I assume it will get even with its budget with the revenues.

The second one is for a british comedy I Give It a Year. With a great cast (Rose Byrne, Simon Baker, Anna Faris, Minnie Driver among others) it certainly seems funny. Judge for yourselves:

That's all folk! New post coming next week!

-46-

This week just flew by! I'm so much behind on my Late Night Shows, I still haven't watched even my Chelsea-Lately's which I normally watch as soon as I can, since they are the bomb. This week my screencaps are a dedication to Amy Poehler and her huge throbbing funny bone that never ceases to make me laugh my ass off.

Top two: Parks and Recreation, bottom two: SNL

FILM

Last week I got pretty excited again with Sam Raimi's The Oz: The Great and Powerful, since it released a brand new set of photos, and later a trailer to accompany them. It still hasn't been revealed which witch is the bad or "wicked" one. Michelle Williams is obviously the good one. I'm thinking Rachel Weitz is the baddie and Mila Kunis is something in between (though she says she is a good one). You can find the pictures here, and trailer below (I found too many good ones this week so I have to spread them around a bit). It still looks pretty spectacular.

I rarely mention music in this blog, but since this song is very likely to get nominated for The Best Original Song Oscar, I had to mention it. Neil Finn created Song Of The Lonely Mountain to be played over the end credits of Peter Jackson's first part of The Hobbit trilogy. Jackson's previous Tolkien trilogy did pretty well in that category, with two nominations and one win.  I tried to attach the song to my blog, but with little success, so you need to go here to hear it.

If you've read my blog intensely, you might remember the upcoming Lego movie The Piece of Resistance. Well now they have added some big stars to the voice cast, like Will Ferrel, Allison Brie, Liam Neeson and Nick Offerman. With that and the old cast (Will Arnett, Chris Pratt), this might be one of the most epic sounding movie yet.

Bunch of casting news caught my eye again. James McAvoy is joining the Julian Assange/Wikileaks movie, directed by Bill Condon. He'll be playing the right-hand man of Assange (played by Benedict Cumberbatch. Kit Harrington (Game of Thrones) might be one of the lead characters of Paul W.S Anderson (Resident Evil- movies) Pompeii movie. The film, obviously, focuses on the devastating day the eponymous volcano erupted. Anne Hathaway has joined the Steven Spielberg adaptation of Robocalypse. Now I don't have any idea what the book is about, but apparently it's a big deal. Ben Whishaw and Chris Hemsworth might be in it too.

It seems like game-to-film adaptations are becoming increasingly popular. One of them is Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell, which has now attached Tom Hardy to play the lead character Sam Fisher. Fisher is a government agent sent out on some very sneaky missions. As the game series went along, he became betrayed by his own organisation and outlawed. Then I stopped playing them so I don't know the rest, maybe this gives me a reason to star them again.

And to finish off this section with a more artistic note: here are the portraits of Les Miserables characters Annie Leibovitz shot for Vogue. As you can expect from her, they are amazing. I'll post just few here, but you can find all of them at /Film.

TV

As a not-so-surprising turn, CBS has decided to cancel Partners, the new comedy from the creators of Will & Grace, Matt Mutchnick and David Kohan. If you read my review of the show, you'll find out why I'm not surprised by this. Though I'm very disappointed at the two of them, since Will & Grace was pure comedic genius.

I honestly didn't think Smash could get any better, but look what happened! Now they have added Liza Minnelli to the cast and though it's just a guest spot, she will be singing at least one totally new song written for the show. Cougar Town has also steadily been adding strong guest stars, like Shirley Jones, which was announced this past week. She hasn't appeared in many shows lately, but even so, she remains a very familiar face from her long career. More about her role in Cougar Town at TVline. Modern Family also added some "star" power to their ranks. Billy Dee Williams who played Lando Calrissian in Star Wars (see my star-pun now?) will play a fellow gambler Jay (Ed O'Neill) meets when their families spend New Year's Eve at Palm Springs.

By now you all should be watching the last season of 30 Rock, since it is epic! And it's about to get a lot more epic-er (?)... Well super epic. Liz Lemon (played by talented Tina Fey) is getting married! I know that by looking at Lemon's past love life, it could have been assumed that she'd get few cats and become a spinster. But then along came Chris Chross (James Marsden), who was just as stupid as Liz, a match made in heaven. NBC released this hilarious wedding invitation to their nuptials. I think every one who is getting married over 30 should have a similar printed out.

I love especially the last line, "bring your own snacks".

TRAILERS

Okay, so as I mentioned, I found a lot of good ones this week. If I'd post them all here, my blog would get soooo slow. So I'll just link you few and the post the rest.

The Mortal Instruments: City Of Bones, which is trying to take over the spot that Twilight leaves. With half angels, Lily Collens and Jamie Cambell Bower, it might just do that. It is the first of six books.

Another one trying to get Twihards on their side is Stephenie Mayer, who pretty much has them all anyways since she created Twilight. But now her next big franchise is hitting the big screens. The Host is a love story (shocker) between two humans who are one of the few remaining in futuristic Earth. Until one of them becomes "the host" of a alien form.

Before we get to see Lindsey Lohan in Liz and Dick as Elizabet Taylor, we were treated to the new trailer of The Canyons. I don't know if it's exactly a treat, but it certainly is something. With very 50's vibe the trailer really doesn't reveal much about the plot, just that there is a lot of drama.

I knew that I wasn't totally wrong when I mixed up Melissa MacCarthy's co-stars few weeks ago. She is starring in a comedy with Jason Bateman, but also one with Sandra Bullock, and that one has gotten a trailer now. As you might expect, The Heat seems hilarious:

There is only one word to describe the trailer for Now You See Me: magical. With a great cast and fine plot, I think this movie will actually be pretty entertaining:

The last one is for a comedy with Tina Fey and Paul Rudd called Admission. I think that says enough about the movie, but here is the trailer:

That's all folks! New post coming next week!

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It's been 45 weeks now since my first post, and THIS is my most watched piece here. Don't know what that says about me and my blog, but carry on! Here are some more screencaps for your enjoyment. Well actually they are GIFs, so click to open them if you don't see them properly on the normal view.

From top left: The Big Bang Theory, Family Guy, Spongebob Squarepants, The Office (that dog gets me every time)

TV

 Let's start with Glee. Last year the students of McKinley High School did West Side Story but this year they are doing Grease (or Glease some have dubbed it). You can listen to most of the songs here, or you can go to Glee's official YouTube channel to find more (just found out it is not working, the notification says it has been deleted, but I assume FOX will have it up in some time, most of the videos from the previous link work though). One of the new students who joined the school this year, was Jake (Jacob Artist) who is the half-brother of Puck (Mark Salling). They share the some father, but different mother and it looks like Jake's mom is about to debut. She'll be played by Aisha Tyler, one of the hosts of The Talk. I can now see where he got the looks.

Few quick casting notes. Gillian Vigman (Suburgatory) will join the fourth season of Cougar Town as the new love interest for Bobby. Looks like it's going to be just a quickie since its just an one episode guest spot (for now). Cougar Town is back Jan 8th. Jane Seymour (you might know her best as Solitaire in the Bond movie Live and Let Die, or as the cougar in that one episode of How I Met Your Mother) joins one of my favourite new comedies, Ben And Kate, as the mother of BJ (Lucy Punch). So both characters are British and have a big appetite for men, this has got to be good! The third cougar coming to TV shows I follow, is Carla Gugino. She'll play Schmidt's flirty boss on New Girl. Gugino was last seen on TV as the reporter in a great show, Political Animals. And great news for all my Finnish readers, the show will start on AVA in few weeks after the first season of Smash ends, on Wednesdays 9 PM.

Rebel Wilson has found a co-star for her ABC comedy Super Fun Night. Liza Lapira (from ABC's Don't Trust The Bitch in Apartment 23) will play the intelligent roomie of Wilson's character. Wilson also made it to the Hollywood Reporter's list of Hollywood's Fastest-Rising Stars. This is a list you should all check out, since we'll be hearing a lot from these guys.

Joe Biden, the vice president of USA, is making a cameo on Parks and Recreation in the coming weeks. We already saw John McCain on the season premiere, so with Ben living in Washington D.C., the show has gotten a lot more political. Biden apparently shot the scenes in early July, but this information was to be kept as a secret until the election (Horray for Obama btw!) so that it wouldn't affect it in anyways. I also found these funny Newsletters that the characters of the show write monthly. You can subscribe for them here!

Two new shows that are in development caught my eye. One is a lifestyle sitcom produced and inspired by Martha Stewart. The idea is pretty funny, a twenty-something party girl wants to quit her bad habits, so she starts to follow the teachings Martha Stewart. I love Stewart, but I really don't think her sense of humour is anything I'll like, so I hope she'll just but out and leave the writers alone so she wont ruin the show. The second one is an upcoming comedy written, produced and starred by Fortune Feimster, a regular face from my favourite late night talk show, Chelsea Lately. And talking about the bitch herself, Chelsea Handler is producing. It will be a multi camera workplace comedy focused on Feimster's character and her sister, who struggle to maintain a successful furniture store. Remember though that both of these are just in pre-production and might never get a full season pickups, hopefully we'll get to see even pilots.

FILM

It's been so long since I last heard about this project, so I kinda forgot it even existed, but now we got the first pictures from the set of Saving Mr. Banks, the story of how Walt Disney convinced the creator of Mary Poppins, P.L. Travers, to sell him the rights for a movie, which turned out to be a huge success though Travers never really enjoyed it. Disney is played by Tom Hanks while Travers is portrayed by Emma Thompson. You can find more pictures here!

Here are some quick casting notes. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson has been cast as Hercules in an upcoming adventure film based on the popular mythical character. There seems to be some sort of plot, but it seems to be just a typical hack-n-slash pic. Brett Ratner (X-Men: The Last Stand) will direct. David Yates, fresh from directing four of the latest Harry Potter movies, will direct yet another adaption of Tarzan. If you read my post from few weeks ago, you know how I feel about Tarzan. This will be a life-action version, so its success will really come down to the fact who will play the main role. Michael Bay is already planning a new Transformers movie, fourth in series, and he has locked Mark Wahlberg to star in it. It seems like he'll play the lead role, but even though he is a tough action star, this will age the movie series considerably since the previous lead character was played by Shia LeBouf. Then the last bit, McG (Charlie's Angels) will direct a movie revolving around the Magic Castle, the privete magic club in L.A. There is no official synopsis yet, but I imagine it would be about a newcomer magician who works his/hers way to the top.

This adorable movie filled with old geezers is bound to receive good reviews. It's called Last Vegas and it stars Morgan Freeman, Robert DeNiro, Kevin Kline and Michael Douglas as old friends who go to have a bachelor party at Las Vegas (sound familiar? Pretty close to the first Hangover movie). The movie is now in production and is expected to come out in December 2013.

SNL co-stars Kristen Wiig and Bill Hader will star with Luke Wilson in an upcoming indie comedy called The Skeleton Twins. Wiig and Hader play two ex-lovers who have a near-death experience at the same time and this makes them reunite and wonder what went wrong. I seems to love everything Kristen Wiig does and Hader is hilarious too, so I think I'm going to enjoy this one.

Since Disney announced its purchase of Lucasfilm last week, the Internet has been all a buzz trying to figure out what the next Star Wars film will be about. Well we might not know that yet, but we do know who will know. And that is Michael Arndt, who will write the script for Star Wars: Episode VII. He won Oscar for writing Little Miss Sunshine, which makes me wonder how he will translate into Sci-Fi genre, especially as he co-wrote Toy Story 3 too. Before Star Wars, he is co-writing Hunger Games: Catching Fire, so that will give him some practice before stepping into some very big wookie-furred shoes.

TRAILERS

I just can't resist sharing the new international trailer for Les Miserables. It will come out in December and this will ease the wait for those of us who can barely sit down. This trailer is also the first where we see Russel Crowe singing. We also get some clips from the Anne Hathaway (Who hosted SNL this weekend) version of I Dreamed A Dream.

The second one is for a horror movie, a genre I don't usually endorse. But this one has Frodo aka. Elijah Wood. The film is called Maniac, and I don't recommend this one for the weak minded.

The last one is for a film we've been waiting for a long time. World War Z has be rescheduled, rescripted and reworked for multiple times, but it's now coming out next summer, we'll have to wait and see if that will happen. The movie is apocalyptic zombie movie starring Brad Pitt, and the trailer looks surprisingly good compared to what I braced myself for.

That's all folks! New post coming next week (hopefully a bit sooner than this)

-44-

I finally got the time to sit down and write this long overdue post, but it's still the week 44, so it counts. A lot has happened during this week in the world of TV and film. I mentioned last time that I might write a review of the new James Bond flick Skyfall, but I wouldn't be able to write it without spoiling the whole thing for those who haven't seen it, since there are are a lot of changes that really affect the future of the whole the brand. But go see it, the film was amazing! It strutted proudly into my Top 5 Bond Movies.

From top left: Will&Grace, Arrested Development, Modern Family, The Simpsons

FILM

How can I not start with one of the biggest news of the week (besides Sandy the Hurricane). George Lucas has sold Lucasfilm to Disney for $4 Billion. And the best part is that we can expect a new Star Wars movie in 2015 and a new movie every two to three years after that, up to Episode IX. I know some die hard fans hate this decision sine they think even the three prequel episodes were total blasphemy, but I really can't see the bad side in this. If the movie doesn't seem good, then don't go see it. Lucas won't be directing or producing himself, but he will serve as a creative consultant. This news of course inspired a lot of things in Internet, like these cool mashup Disney/Star Wars posters. And this awesome video: 

Compared to this, every other news seem so minor. But the fact that Arnold Scwartzenegger will step into the boots of Conan the Barbarian once more, is pretty major too. The new film, Legend Of Conan, will be a sort of reboot, since it ignores the latest reboot from 2011 with Jason Momoa and it will also ignore the second of Arnold's two Conan films.In this the new film Conan will be obviously pretty old and starting to realise that his life won't last forever and decides to go out with a good battle. I'm pretty sure they won't kill the character in the movie, but anything could happen.

George Clooney's next directorial effort, Monuments Men, is starting to look pretty amazing. First of all, the story sounds interesting: A group of Allied historians and curators try to save priceless pieces of art from the hands of Hitler who deems some works degenerate. And secondly, look at the cast! First Bill Murray and Cate Blanchett were announced to have roles in the movie. Then John Goodman, Daniel Craig and Jean Dujurdin joined the cast. How can this not be good ? (And Oscar-worthy?) The filming will start next spring, so the movie might come out just at the end of 2013 to qualify for 2014 Oscars. Or that's what I hope, can't wait to see the film!

John Logan will write the next two James Bond movies. At first they were reported to have an arc which would combine the two, but Daniel Craig denied that rumour. Logan has previously written such masterpieces as Hugo, The Aviator and Gladiator. These two would be most likely the last two films with Daniel Craig, since they played "the old scruffy agent"-card now on Skyfall. Naomi Harris suggested that Idris Elba should play the next Bond, making him the first African-American Bond, but that is just a rumour and everything can (and will) change once we reach Bond film number 26. (Skyfall is 23th)

Unlike the first Captain American movie, the sequel will be set in modern times. This will allow the film to be more tied up with the Avengers universe. Especially now that Colbie Smoulders and Samuel L. Jackson have signed on to reprise their roles in Captain America: The Winter Soldier as the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents they played in the Avengers. Though this is good promotion also for the upcoming  S.H.I.E.L.D. TV series, it will make it hard for these two to appear in the show, since in the movie universe Agent Coulson died, but in TV he lives on. Would be hard for them to explain how the agents would react around each other when they've seen one of them die. Well, strange things can happen in the world of comics, so who knows.

And to the end of this segment, I present you with the first look of Wicked Witch in the new poster for Oz: The Great and Powerful. Under that layer of make-up hides either Mila Kunis or Rachel Weisz, it is not clear which one, since they both will play Wicked Witches, Theodora and Evanora. Either way, the picture looks good!

TV

A lot has happened in TV too. Most shocking news for me was the fact that Up All Night would be changed in to multi-camera format with live audience. This is very unusual for a TV show and honestly I can't yet see how it will work, or if it will destroy the show. Single-camera shows are a lot more popular format at the moment, but then again Big Bang Theory and Two And A Half Men are one of the most watched TV shows and they are both multi-camera comedies. These new episodes of Up All Night will start airing next spring after their winter hiatus, but we still get six more episodes of the good old single-camera format. One of the stars of the show, Maya Rudpolh is also expanding to another form of performing. Her Prince cover band, Princess, has book a gig head lining at the Largo, in L.A. They also performed at the Late Night with Jimmy Fallon few weeks ago and were pretty good! I couldn't find very good quality video of the show, but you can get the gist from this.

All news can't be good though. Unfortunately NBC has decided to pass on The Office spin-off The Farm. Rainn Wilson would have reprised his role as Dwight Schrute but now instead they will just air the already filmed pilot for the nixed show as an gift to commemorate the final season of The Office. Second bad news is that Political Animals won't have any extra episodes. Though the show was initially planned as a mini-series, there were a lot of rumours that it would come back for the second season, but now those dreams have been crushed. At least we got the first season.

Kim Cattrall will star in and produce an U.S adaptation of the Sensitive Skin (U.K). She has some big shoes to step into, since Joanna Lumley played the original character. The show is about a woman struggling with mid-life crisis. To describe the original show as a comedy, is pretty misleading, since it's very dark comedy, with a lot of drama aspects. It reminds me of Nurse Jackie, since its funny, but not in a comedy kind of way. Though this adaptation was first set to air on HBO, they have passed on the deal and now Cattrall is working with Canadian partners, but it is expected to get aired on U.S networks too.

ART

I didn't really know which segment to put these under, so I created a new one, though don't expect these every month. Firstly the October edition of Vulutre's Best Entertainment Photography was pretty spectacular. Here are some of them (Angela Lansbury on the left, and Jennifer Lawrence next to her), but you can find the all at Vulture.

I also found this amazing new poster for Iron Man 3. Matt Ferguson, creator of this beauty, also created artwork for the  Avengers DVD-box. Scroll down this page to see some other examples for his work.

TRAILERS 

This first trailer isn't brand new, but I just wanted to remind you about it since the movie Flight just came out and it looks like a pretty strong platform for Denzel Washington to get Oscar nominated. He plays a pilot who manages to save most of his passengers when he performs a near-impossible emergency landing (while a bit drunk). The rest of the cast includes such stars as John Goodman (he's everywhere at the moment) and Melissa Leo.

The second is for the movie that I honestly never thought I'd see: Die Hard 5. The fact that they even made fourth Die Hard was just beyond me, it was really bad. And honestly it looks like this won't be any better. Though it is packed with awesome action segments, it can't save this parachuteless freefall that is Die Hard 5. The full name is A Good Day To Die Hard and it will star Bruce Willis. Cole Hauser and Sebastian Koch.

I love Despicable Me's minions and thankfully that is all the new trailer is filled with. In Despicable Me 2, the minions get kidnapped and Gru has to find them. If you don't know about the minions, just go to YouTube and search "despicable me minions". You'd be surprised how much fun they are.

 Just look at how cute he is in a french maid's dress!!!

That's all folks! New post coming next week!