The Strain is the first book in a trilogy of novels from Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan that dives into a dark world inhabited by vampires. Once upon a time, it was said that the plan was to turn the idea into a television series, but when pitched to everyone’s favorite station, Fox, they asked that it be turned into a comedy more like Buffy the Vampire Slayer instead of being dark and horrifying. This not-so-successful TV pitch is what eventually lead to the decision to write the books, instead.

Now it appears that a TV series is again just as possible as ever before. It’s being reported that that Grady Twins Productions — a newly established company from talented female duo Marti Noxon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) and Dawn Parouse Olmstead (Prison Break) — has begun working with del Toro to develop a series that is planned to run at least three seasons. The plan is to put something together and begin shopping it around to potential buyers next year after the second book in the series is released. [...]

We love a good Shatner story, and today we have a few to share with you.

Earlier this week, William Shatner made an appearance on The Tonight Show, where he recited Gov. Sarah Palin’s resignation speech as poetry. Palin had promised her supporters that she’d keep in touch via Twitter and she most certainly has been doing so. So, Shatner went on The Tonight Show again last night to recite her most interesting tweets.

You can watch both video segments here below.

In other Shatner news, the Star Trek vet put the pressure on Hewlett-Packard this week, leaving a company-wide voicemail message for staff of the computer giant.

“This is William Shatner. You, HP, promised me a toxic free computer by 2009. Now my friends at Greenpeace tell me I will have to wait until 2011. What’s up with that?… Please ask your leader, Mark Hurd, to make computers that are free of toxic PVC plastic and brominated flame retardants just as Apple has done.”

The Gold Box deal of the day today at Amazon is Futurama — Volumes 1-4 on DVD for only $42.99 (down 64% from the list price of $119.96).

The set contains DVDs for Seasons 1-4 of the popular animated FOX television series from Simpsons creator Matt Groening. Each DVD comes with bonus features, such as deleted scenes and commentaries.

This is a great deal, considering that the individual season DVDs are currently going for $20-$24 a piece [...]

Battlestar Galactica creator Ronald D. Moore’s followup television series Virtuality will have a commentary track to go along with its pilot episode, he stated during the San Diego Comic-Con panel for Caprica and BSG: The Plan.

“I’m going to do a commentary for it whether they fraking pick it up or not,” Moore said. “It will be done.”

The show has yet to be greenlit by FOX for full production. Currently it hasn’t been announced as a direct to market DVD, which would not stop Moore from doing the commentary anyway, he said [...]

Dethklok, the band from Adult Swim’s series Metalocalypse, is heading to Xbox Live Arcade and the Playstation Network in a new game from Konami.

Users will play as a Dethklok roadie named Klokateer who will go up against “a heinous rampage [of] rabid mutant fans in brutal combat,” while protecting the pure fans that are presumably non-mutants. And off course players will be entertained with music from Dethklok, including three all-new songs.

While I am psyched about the idea of a totally metal game like this, I’m a little disappointed that there’s no mention of The Goon, who most recently crossed paths with the Norwegian musicians in the 32-page one-shot Dethklok vs The Goon comic from Dark Horse. If you are bashing mutants or the like, then it’s only natural to let him crossover again as a secret or unlockable character. (I don’t even really care if he kills the roadie, just put him in, ok game studio!?) [...]

Those that own the entire Battlestar Galactica library of DVDs will soon get their money’s worth, or at least another viewing, according to Edward James Olmos‘ statement during the Caprica/BSG: The Plan panel at the San Diego Comic-Con.

“After you watch the very last scene of The Plan, you’re going to have to rewatch the entire season,” said Olmos, who directed the film, which will be released on Blu-ray and DVD on October 27 with a November premiere on the SyFy Network to follow.

The movie’s story is told from the perspective of the show’s protagonist, the Cylons and their plan to exterminate the human race, which presented a challenge for the writing team, according to head writer Jane Espenson. She compared the script to a puzzle since the movie uses preexisting footage from all five seasons of the show [...]

The crowd in Ballroom 20 was given a great show first thing Saturday morning at San Diego Comic-Con this year, thanks to the rock stylings of the band Jeffster. Fans of NBC’s Chuck will know what Jeffster is, but for the uninitiated, Jeffster is a band made up of Jeff (Scott Krinsky) and Lester (Vik Sahay), two of the title character’s co-workers. They’ve shown up a couple of times in Season 2 of the show, and they usually play 80’s rock classics. Saturday, they went a little further back and played Queen’s 1978 classic “Fat Bottom Girls.” To say that the fans in the crowd ate it up is an understatement. Everyone in the crowd was on their feet, and I think they made a few new fans in the crowd who were waiting for other panels.

As for the rest of the panel, the whole cast was there to talk about the show, but mostly they were there to thank the fans for the efforts they made to bring the show back for a third season.

It was revealed that the new season may premier earlier than had been previously announced, but no actual date was given [...]

It seems like sometimes you find yourself at some weird panels when you’re waiting around for other ones you really want to go to, which is how I ended up in the panel for Batman: The Brave & the Bold, the animated series running on Cartoon Network.

Boy, am I glad I ended up there, because I was able to see a premiere episode that knocked my socks off, and that I think you’ll enjoy too. The episode is titled “Mayhem of the Music Meister” and features Neil Patrick Harris as the Music Meister, an evil musician who takes control of the heroes and villains and makes them sing. The music in the episode was genius, and the end of the episode was greeted by a standing ovation from the audience. When this episode airs, you too can see Aquaman dancing with Gorilla Grodd! Trust me, I fell in love with this show based on this episode. If you love musicals, if you love Batman, you will really get a kick out of this episode.

Aside from seeing this premiere, the audience was treated to a fun discussion by the creators and voice actors. It was awesome to see Deidrich Bader (Batman), John Dimaggio (Aquaman), and James Arnold Taylor (Green Arrow) act out the voices. One young audience member addressed Bader as Batman, at which point Bader responded in full Batman voice [...]

Caprica, the prequel spin-off series of Battlestar Galactica, will have its share of “Easter eggs” and nods to BSG along the way but will ultimately stand on its own, according to creators Ronald D. Moore and David Eick at a San Diego Comic-Con panel.

Some of these “Easter eggs” would be using some of the same scenes found in Battlestar, such as the Opera House that appeared in President Rosalin’s visions of the final five Cylons.

“We’re not trying to give you Battlestar. I think it would be a shot of pain to do that,” Moore said, adding that the show would have its own roots.

“It is like Battlestar in the sense that the answers are never what you expect them to be… but there is more potential for mass appeal because this is Rome before the fall,” said Eick. “It’s much more like our modern world.” [...]

If puny human drinks aren’t cutting it for you, HBO will start selling bottles of the Tru Blood beverage made popular from the television show of the same name (but not the same spelling), True Blood produced by Alan Ball.

The beverage itself is a blood orange flavored-soda, rather than synthetic Japanese-engineered blood like on the show and doesn’t officially hit retail stores until early September. However, you can pre-order them now at the HBO Shop. A 4-pack of 14 oz. glass bottles will run you $16, but bigger fans (Truer Blood fans?) can go for the 24-pack for $96 [...]

The Venture Brothers and the rest of the Adult Swim line-up (sans Robot Chicken, which got its own panel earlier in the week) shared a panel on Saturday at San Diego Comic-Con, and the big news for some coming out of this is that the U.K. version of The Office will begin airing on the channel in September.

Originally airing in 2001, the series starred Ricky Gervais and is of course the basis for the popular American version airing on NBC. A total of 12 episodes and two Christmas specials were made for the UK show. If you think that this is an odd choice of a show to air on Adult Swim, keep in mind that they already run other British live-action comedies, such as Look Around You, Black Books, and The Mighty Boosh, so it should be a good fit.

Other pieces of news from the panel:

Metalocalypse Season 3 will premiere on November 8th, and the episodes will all run for a half hour [...]

Word making its way out of San Diego Comic Con ‘09 is that the Futurama panel was a major downer and that none of the cast members who were expected to appear were present. Naturally, this all stems from the current salary dispute between the majorly-talented voice actors and 20th Century Fox, who recently put out a casting call for new voice actors in case no agreement is reached (Read: FOX Hates Your Guts With Every Single Inch Of Their Being; Possibly Looking To Re-Cast ‘Futurama’). It’s being reported by Topless Robot that the only thing that came out of the Comic Con panel, was that show creators Matt Groening and David X. Cohen basically just asked that we all cross our fingers and hope for the best, which we’ve all been doing for years now anyway.

Surprisingly, this isn’t all that came out of the Con, though. IGN actually found Bender Bending Rodriguez himself, John DiMaggio, at Comic Con and was able to ask him where things stood. DiMaggio, in his typical outgoing and happy style offered his own personal view of what was going on and what he thought would happen. He even opened with a little song by a man named Elvis. [...]

The Gold Box deal of the day today at Amazon is the DVD boxset of The Twilight Zone: The Complete Definitive Collection for only $105.99 (65% the list price of $299.99).

The DVD set includes all 156 complete episodes on 28 discs of the classic Rod Serling scifi television series that brought viewers each week to another dimension into The Twilight Zone. The episodes have been remastered with high-definition film transfers.

Bonus materials include the Serling bio-documentary Submitted for Your Approval, along with interviews with the show’s writers, the unaired the series’ pilot, audio commentaries with Martin Landau, Leonard Nimoy, Cliff Robertson and much, more [...]

Back in November, it was announced that HBO had ordered a pilot episode for a show called Game of Thrones, which is based on the highly-popular fantasy book series by George R.R. Martin, A Song of Fire and Ice (Read: George R.R. Martin’s ‘A Song Of Ice And Fire’ Series Heads For HBO). The pilot will be directed by Tom McCarthy, who is a well-known character actor who has appeared in movies like Meet the Parents and a slew of George Clooney movies including Syriana, Good Night, and Good Luck, and Michael Clayton. Mr. McCarthy is a multi-talented man, though, and does have some writing and directing experience, having directed wonderful movies like The Station Agent and Oscar-nominated The Visitor, as well as a story writer on Pixar’s Up. The pilot is one of about ten that will attempt to obtain a full series treatment by HBO.

To assure that they give it all that they have, the show is putting together quite the cast. Most-notably, Sean Bean has just been cast in the role of Lord Eddard Stark, an honorable man who becomes an adviser to the king. [...]

I’m not feeling great this week, so when the floodgates opened up today with a frenzy of backlash in regard to the news that 20th Century Fox is looking to re-cast all of the voice actors for the revival of Futurama…well, my little illness tripled over on me. That’s right, after making the giant announcement that the show would return (Read: Never Underestimate The Power Of Hypnotoad: ‘Futurama’ Is Officially Back!), they now are looking to replace brilliant talents like Billy West (Philip J. Fry, Professor Hubert Farnsworth, Dr. Zoidberg, Leo Wong, Zapp Brannigan), John Di Maggio (Bender), Katey Sagal (Turanga Leela), Phil LaMarr (Hermes Conrad), Maurice LaMarche (Kif, Donbot, Morbo, Calculon) and others.

At first, many believed it was just some sort of marketing ploy and that the plan was to throw everyone into a panic and then throw some big surprise party with the cast showing up and all being well in the world. Though this scenario would be accepted and laughed about later, I believe it would still infuriate fans to hear they purposely did this. However, it appears that word first broke out when multiple cast members mentioned it on their Facebook, which takes away a Comic Con surprise. [...]

If Richard Hatch (Battlestar Galactica) has his way, the future of great science fiction programming will be user generated, not studio produced.

In an interview with Geeks of Doom, the actor/writer/director says he plans to launch an online network (first reported last year) comprised of original web based series that would not only unleash the creativity and talent in the sci-fi/fantasy community, but also cultivate it.

“So often sci-fi shows are run by people who, I don’t really think, understand Science Fiction. Too many great shows go down way too soon,” says Hatch, who listed Firefly, Babylon 5, and others involving spaceships as just some of the casualties. “They’ve all gone off the air because those networks aren’t set up to serve the sci-fi community.” [...]

The boys of legendary comedy troupe Monty Python rarely get together anymore. Reunions have been rumored many times, but in the past ten-plus years, the group has only gathered together two times: once for a group interview in 1998, and a second time in 2002 for the George Harrison memorial.

Now The Independent is reporting that of the six-man group, four will reunite for a live stage show based on their very own Life of Brian called Not The Messiah (He’s a Very Naughty Boy). Python members Michael Palin, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Terry Gilliam will appear in the show, while John Cleese can’t make it due to a scheduling conflict and of course Graham Chapman passed away in 1989.

The show, which will reference many classic sketches, stars Eric Idle, who also wrote it with John Du Prez. The rest of the Monty Python guys — including another Flying Circus regular Carol Cleveland with Neil Innes — will make appearances within the production. [...]

True Blood
Season 1 DVD
Series Creator, Writer, Director: Alan Ball
Starring: Anna Paquin, Stephen Moyer, Ryan Kwanten, Sam Trammell, Rutina Wesley, Nelsan Ellis
HBO Home Entertainment
Release Date: May 19, 2009

By taking the blood of the night into our bodies, we water the flowers of our souls.

Nothing is real.

Everything is permitted.

Deep south. Rednecks. Vampires that live among us. These are the main components to True Blood, the ultra-graphic HBO show from Alan Ball (American Beauty) which has completed their first incredibly successful first season and is currently moving into their second season.

The show is based on the The Southern Vampire Mysteries series of books and follows young Sookie Stackhouse (Anna Paquin), a simple southern belle with the mysterious ability to read minds who works as a waitress at Merlotte’s, the local bar in Bon Temps, Louisiana — a religious town that doesn’t have any known vampire residents. One day in this quiet town, a vampire named Bill (Stephen Moyer) shows up at the bar, and Sookie immediately greets him with a glowing curiosity which turns into real chemistry after she saves his life. This newfound vampire connection has Sookie’s boss Sam (Sam Trammell) and best friend Tara (Rutina Wesley) angry and watching carefully. Unfortunately, right around the time that Bill the vampire shows up, multiple women in this small town start showing up dead and no one really knows why — but many are quick to point a sharp finger, either at Bill, or at Sookie’s ladies man brother Jason (Ryan Kwanten), who is always romantically (physically) connected to the victims [...]

Today’s Gold Box deal of the day over at Amazon is Lois & Clark – The New Adventures of Superman – The Complete Seasons 1-4 on DVD for only $83.99.

For this discounted price, you get all four seasons of the 1990’s television series starring Dean Cain as Clark Kent/Superman and a pre-Desperate Housewives Teri Hatcher as Lois Lane, Clark’s colleague and love interest.

Note, this sale is today for one day only and is valid while supplies last [...]

With the recent avalanche of remakes and reboots being announced, I can say in all honesty that it’s actually a bit of a breath of fresh air to hear about a new TV adaptation.

T.J. Hooker, the Aaron Spelling show that starred William Shatner and Heather Locklear, is now being developed into a big screen feature length action comedy. The show followed T.J. Hooker (Shatner), a cop who voluntarily demotes himself after his partner is slain so that he can train rookie cops and get back to the hands-on work. One of the rookies he teams up with is a cocky young kid who doesn’t make things easy for Hooker. It ran from 1982 to 1986.

Chuck Russell is currently in talks to direct the adaptation. He’s best known for his work helming The Scorpion King and The Mask, but also has done The Blob (1988), Eraser, and A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors. He was a producer on Michael Mann’s Collateral, as well. [...]