From the folks who are doing Once Upon A Time, another twisty little show, this time redoing Alice for modern times: Once Upon A Time In Wonderland. It hits the small screen (OK, not so small for those who have 4K TVs with a huge screen, but lots of us are still watching in SD) on October 10th on ABC. It tends to look like the creators watched the Syfy channel’s Alice and said “I could do that, but with an American accent”, but I really don’t care. I will watch any variation of a classic by Lewis G. Carrol, Frank L. Baum, Edgar Rice Burroughs, or a select few other writers from the 1800s, and enjoy them no matter where they take them.
Star Trek Into Darkness starts us off this week, continuing the excellent J.J. Abrams reboot of the franchise. I would buy a 4K TV to watch this on, if I didn’t need to eat or pay rent for the next few years, it was just that good. I am going to count Delete as a movie, since it was a miniseries on a cable system channel about movies called Reelz. Seth Green and Matt Frewer have to save the world when the internet wakes up and decides humans are dangerous and unnecessary. The Last Keepers is a family friendly show about a young woman who discovers all the women in her family have mysterious powers; the trailer looks great and the cast is very impressive, but I couldn’t find a home page for it. I won’t bother to mention Frankenstein’s Army.
In TV, Supernatural: The Complete 8th Season looks like the best bet this week, although Castle: The Complete 5th Season is a lot of fun even if it isn’t genre.
In Anime, Blue Exorcist: The Complete 2nd Season continues the battle between demons and humans with episodes 13 through 25. Our protagonist Rin is on trial at the Vatican to determine if he will be imprisoned or inducted into their anti-demon army. Bleach: Season 18 brings us up to episodes 256 through 267 as the Soul Reapers continue their never ending battles with things that would destroy humans.
Last Exile: Fam, The Silver Wing comes out as two box sets, parts 1 and 2, totaling 21 episodes. This is the sequel to The Last Exile, in which the Earth was restored and a long war ended through Steampunk Mad Science. In this series, those who survived remaining behind on the surface of the Earth make war on the returning exiles, attempting to destroy country after country. The final new entry this week is This Boy Caught a Merman, about an unusual relationship that has more to overcome than most.
There is a re-release worth noting this time around: Patlabor: The Mobile Police TV Series collection 2 is episodes 13 through 24 of this classic series. The director (and one of the writers) on this series was Mamoru Oshii, who went on to do all the different Ghost In The Shell Cyberpunk movies and TV series, and first became famous for his work as director of the very surreal Urusei Yatsura.
Yes, the Luggage Family were all there at NADWCon this year in Baltimore. Daddy Luggage was built for me by my good friend Jenn, and she built herself the purse version Mommy Luggage, slightly smaller on the other side. Offler (her Con name obviously, and too bad you can’t see her Crocodile hat properly in this image) built herself the darling little Child Luggage, complete with the painted toenails as described in the books. If you are one of the few people out there asking yourself what books? at this point, you have a treat in store for you. The books of Sir Terry Pratchett are amazing and hysterical, satirical and more than a bit silly, and very much worth your time to check out.
The only genre film I have located this week is Abigail Harm a fantasy romance base on a Korean folk tail. It is only in limited release; so limited that I think it may only be playing in one theater in New York City. But hopefully the rest of us will have access to it soon.
Matt Smith and Jenna Coleman shared a few small factoids about Doctor Who at Comic Con this year that are worth being aware of, so here they are. Also, a heads up: The guy who created and wrote Misfits, Howard Overman, has created a new series for the BBC. Atlantis is being made by the producers of Merlin, and will occupy its old time slot on Saturdays. BBC America is co-producing it, and will be carrying it this fall, also on Saturdays.
There are a couple of great choices this week. The film Mortal Instruments: City of Bones actually hits the big screen on Wednesday, the 21st. Based on the YA series of urban fantasy novels by Cassandra Clare, Sony is no doubt hoping for the same kind of audience reaction earned by the Twilight and Hunger Games franchises. There are 5 more books already written and ready to turn into films, as well as 3 Steampunk prequels set in the Victorian era, so if this does well expect to see more. Then on Friday, The World’s End completes the Cornetto Trilogy, which started with Shawn Of The Dead and continued in Hot Fuzz.