[Televisionary]

After weeks of anticipation (and speculation), Syfy has finally announced which series they will be bringing down to San Diego Comic-Con next month. The cabler will be offering panels based around Caprica and telepic Battlestar Galactica: The Plan , Eureka , Sanctuary, Warehouse 13 , and Stargate Universe . Additionally, Syfy will be taking over the Hard Rock Cafe and will re-brand the eatery as Eureka ’s own “Cafe Diem” for entire breadth of the convention. Cafe Diem will be the focal point for many of Syfy's planned activities throughout the convention. The full press release from Syfy can be be found below, along with dates and times (and descriptions) of each of their panels. SCI FI FEATURES FAN FAVORITE SERIES AND STARS AT COMIC-CON INTERNATIONAL 2009 New York, NY – June 30, 2009 – In keeping with its longstanding tradition of hosting some of Comic-Con’s most popular, crowd-pleasing events over the years, SCI FI Channel will once again feature some of its biggest hits – as we

Ending several months of rumors, FX has now officially announced the launch dates for its returning series Sons of Anarchy, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia , and nip/tuck . Season Two of Sons of Anarchy will kick off on Tuesday, September 8th at 10 pm ET/PT. The second season of the Charlie Hunnam-led series will feature guest turns by Alan Arkin and Henry Rollins. It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia returns for a fifth season of madcap adventures on Thursday, September 17th. The twelve-episode season will air Thursday nights at 10 pm ET/PT. nip/tuck returns for its sixth and penultimate season of ten episodes in October (specific date TBA). Guest stars next season will include Vanessa Redgrave, Rose McGowan, Mario Lopez, Barry Bostwick and Gilles Marini. Additionally, the network will also launch an as-yet-unannounced new comedy series as a companion to It's Always Sunny on Thursday evenings. (I'd assume, then, that the poorly-received Testees won't be back fo

Torchwood: Children of Earth star John Barrowman has lashed out at the BBC for "punishing" the Doctor Who spin-off series as it moved from BBC Two to BBC One with the third season, when its episodic count was reduced from a traditional thirteen to a leaner five episodes. Barrowman made the comments in the latest issue of the UK's Radio Times , which hit newsstands today, just a few days before the launch of Torchwood: Children of Earth in the United Kingdom. Unlike in previous seasons, Torchwood: Children of Earth is being stripped five nights a week in an "event" format by both BBC One and BBC America in the States. "I'm going to get a little political and I'll probably get into trouble for it, but... we were the most successful show on BBC3, ever," Barrowman told Radio Times . "We moved to BBC2 because the ratings were so good; the ratings were great again and we were beating shows that had been on BBC2 for a long time. The decision

Fans of Showtime's imported British drama series Secret Diary of a Call Girl might want to check out the second season on DVD, which is being released today. After all, Season Two of Secret Diary of a Call Girl finds Hannah, a.k.a. high class call girl Belle ( Doctor Who 's Billie Piper), branching out onto her own while juggling all matter of problems, not least of which is her confused relationship with best friend Ben (Iddo Goldberg), a flighty protege named Bambi ( The Beautiful Life 's Ashley Madekwe), and the prospect of genuine happiness with boyfriend Alex ( Dead Like Me 's Callum Blue). The only problem is that Hannah hasn't quite gotten around to telling Alex, a dashing doctor recently relocated to London, what she does for a living. (Or who she does, really.) Season Two of the witty and provocative series finds Hannah living a double-life once again, lying to Alex even as she falls for him and trying to work up the courage to reveal to him who she reall

Welcome to your Tuesday morning television briefing. Sons of Anarchy 's Drea de Matteo (best known as The Sopranos ' Adrianna) is joining the cast of ABC's Desperate Housewives next season as a series regular, reports Entertainment Weekly 's Michael Ausiello. De Matteo will play "the matriarch of a new Italian family," writes Ausiello. "Casting is underway for her landscape designer husband and their tightly wound son." ( Entertainment Weekly 's Ausiello Files ) Christopher Meloni and Mariska Hargitay WILL be coming back to NBC's Law & Order: Special Victims Unit next season, after all. The duo have finally signed deals that will keep them in the lead roles on the NBC drama series for the next two seasons and will be paid just slightly less than $400,000 per episode. Neal Baer also closed a deal to remain on board the series as showrunner and Christine Lahti ( Jack & Bobby ) has signed on to guest star in the first four episodes of

"And then there she was/Like double cherry pie..." I had the opportunity to watch the first four episodes of Season Two of True Blood a few weeks back but I've been rewatching the episodes as they're airing on HBO so that I don't forget any of the plot twists. I don't know about you but I thought that last night's episode of True Blood ("Scratches"), written by Raelle Tucker and directed by Scott Winant, was the best of the season so far. It's a good thing I did tune in again as it contained one of my favorite scenes of the first four episodes, the sultry entrance of Jessica (the intoxicating Deborah Ann Woll) at Merlotte's to the delicious tune of Marcy Playground's " Sex and Candy ," one of the most seductive and memorable sequences to unfold on the series to date. Woll's Jessica is a sight to behold. Other actresses may have made her little more than a spoiled brat turned nocturnal killer, but Woll infus

I'm really bummed that more people didn't tune in to watch Friday night's broadcast of Ronald D. Moore and Michael Taylor's superlative two-hour pilot for Virtuality , directed by Peter Berg. You read my advance review of the gripping and haunting two-hour pilot of FOX's Virtuality but, now that it's aired, I am curious to hear what you think. (Missed the two-hour pilot? You can watch the whole thing at Hulu .) According to Hollywood Reporter 's The Live Feed , "The two-hour premiere of Ron Moore's sci-fi pilot drew only 1.8 million viewers and received a 0.5 adult demo rating -- tying ABC's "The Goode Family" as the lowest-rated program on a major broadcast network Friday night and putting Fox into fourth place for the evening." What I'm wondering is: why didn't more of you tune in to watch what was one of the more original and unique projects to come along in a long time? Were you put off by the twisty subject matter? O

Ah, the death of the American dream. You read my advance review of the first four episodes of HBO's Hung , which premiered last night after True Blood , but now that it's aired, I'm curious to know what you thought of the Dmitry Lipkin/Colette Burson-created dramedy series. Did you buy Thomas Jane as a sad sack high school basketball coach and fallen golden boy forced to rely on his, er, sizable endowment in order to make ends meet? Did you think that he and Tanya (Jane Adams) would have fallen into bed and into business together as quickly as they did? Do you think their Happiness Consultant idea has any chance of survival in these tough economic times? Did you wonder whether Ray and Jessica (Anne Heche) were ever happy together? And, most importantly, will you be tune in again to watch another episode? Talk back here.

Welcome to your Monday morning television briefing. Mark Pellegrino ( Lost ) has been cast in CW's Supernatural next season, where he will play none other than Lucifer himself. Pellegrino, who will recur on Supernatural next season, is expected to first appear on the series' September 10th season premiere. Meanwhile, don't look for him to give up his other role: that of Jacob on ABC's Lost , which he could easily do as well given his recurring status on Supernatural . ( Entertainment Weekly 's Ausiello Files ) Missy Peregrym ( Reaper ) has been cast as the lead in Canadian police drama Copper , which will air Stateside on ABC. Peregrym will play Andy McNally, "a newly minted cop fresh from the academy and the daughter of a homicide detective" who "is anxious about her first day on the job, which doesn't go as well as she had wished." Series is described as " Grey's Anatomy set in the world of rookie cops." ABC closed a deal t

Televisionary is proud to be a member of the TV Blog Coalition. At the end of each week, we'll feature a roundup of content from our sister sites for your delectation. This week, I offered an elegy for ABC's canceled The Unusuals and offered advance reviews of FOX's Virtuality , BBC America's Doctor Who: The Next Doctor , NBC's The Philanthropist , the return of ABC's Better Off Ted , and the first four episodes of HBO's Hung . I also discussed the latest episode of Bravo's Top Chef Masters and news of AMC's latest series order for thriller Rubicon , had several updates on the 2009 San Diego Comic-Con International schedule , interviews with Virtuality co-creator Ronald D. Moore and the cast and crew of Torchwood: Children of Earth , and offered new trailers for NBC's upcoming series Community , Trauma , and Parenthood . Elsewhere in the sophisticated TV-obsessed section of the blogosphere, members of the TV Blog Coalition were discussing th

"I'm alive/And I'm alone/And I've never wanted to be either of those." - Chemical Brothers It's rare that a network ever airs a pilot that it doesn't intend to order to series, much less one that has engendered quite so much support from viewers ahead of its broadcast. And yet that's just what FOX is doing tonight with the gripping and sensational two-hour pilot for sci-fi drama Virtuality , from creators Ronald D. Moore and Michael Taylor of Battlestar Galactica fame. (You can find an exclusive interview with Michael Taylor here and a write-up of a press call with Ron Moore here .) Virtuality , gorgeously directed by Peter Berg ( Friday Night Lights ) is a mind-bending, acid-trip exploration of deepest space and the innermost recesses of the human heart. Deftly combining space-set action with reality television, Virtuality seeks to answer some eternal questions about the nature of reality itself. What is real? What's fantasy? And what happens w

It seems only fitting that the final Doctor Who specials starring David Tennant (who will leave the series at the end of the year) should be airing on BBC America. There's a sense that the legendary sci-fi series is finally coming home and I think that as the series is so quintessentially British that it only makes sense that it should be airing on the most British of networks, BBC America. The channel is using the first two of the five David Tennant Doctor Who specials as the linchpin for the launch of its HD simulcast channel next month. Said launch will coincide with the US premiere of Doctor Who: Planet of the Dead on July 26th and spin-off Torchwood: Children of Earth the week earlier. But before all that, there's Doctor Who: The Next Doctor , which aired on BBC One in the UK last Christmas and airs tomorrow night on BBC America. It stars David Tennant as the Doctor, still reeling from the events of the Season Four finale, in which companion Donna Noble (Catherine Tate

Welcome to your Friday morning television briefing. The Chicago Tribune 's Maureen Ryan has an absolutely fantastic interview with Doctor Who star David Tennant on the eve of BBC America's airing of last Christmas' Doctor Who special "The Next Doctor." Among the topics of discussion: the end of his run on the legendary British sci-fi series, the truth behind the all-Doctors reunion rumors (false, says Tennant), and what's next for the actor (Poliakoff's Glorious 39 ), among other things. "I'm all finished," said Tenannt of his run on Doctor Who . "Three or four weeks ago, I filmed my last scene. So it's over. Still a long time to go before they're all broadcast, though, so I'm still clinging on for a bit. But yeah, it's done. It was very emotional, very exciting. We managed to go out with some of the best scripts I had in four years. So it was a real treat." ( Chicago Tribune 's The Watcher ) Jeri Ryan ( Shark

After weeks of anticipation (and speculation), Warner Bros. Television Group has finally announced which series they will be bringing down to San Diego Comic-Con next month. All of the usual suspects-- Chuck, Fringe, Supernatural, Smallville , and The Big Bang Theory --will be in attendance along with new series from the studio including V, Human Target, Past Life, Eastwick , and Vampire Diaries and animated series Batman: The Brave and the Bold . Additionally, Warner Bros. Entertainment (WBE) will once again have a nearly 3,000-square foot, two-story booth right on the convention floor and will naturally be giving away those exclusive and ubiquitous Comic-Con Bags. The full press release from Warner Bros. Television Group, along with dates, times, and locations (as well as full descriptions) of their panels can be found below. WARNER BROS. TELEVISION GROUP RETURNS TO COMIC-CON IN 2009 WITH STAR-STUDDED LINEUP FEATURING A RECORD 11 SHOWS Stars and Creators of “The Big Bang Theory,” “C

"There are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy, and the tired." - F. Scott Fitzgerald, "The Great Gatsby" With the economy tanking and pink slips becoming an ubiquitous confetti in cities across America, it's no surprise that many creators are mining the potential death of the American dream for dramatic potential. Throughout his career, writer/executive producer Dmitry Lipkin has succeeded at showing the dark side of that dream. In his short-lived (albeit much missed) FX series The Riches , Lipkin used a family of Travelers, the ultimate modern society outsiders, as a means for exploring just what materialism and suburban trappings meant to the psychic landscape. In Hung , the new HBO series Lipkin co-created with Colette Burstein, the subject of the American dream looms large. This time, the focus is on Ray Drecker (Thomas Jane), a down-on-his-luck Michigan basketball coach/high school history teacher whose life is literally falling down around h