The Point Radio: Julie Benz’ Summer Of Turmoil On DEFIANCE

The second season of DEFIANCE has exploded on The SyFy Network and after the events of last year, the characters find themselves in deep turmoil. Series star Julie Benz (“Amanda”) talks about where we find her this season and what we just might expect for the show as the summer goes on. Meanwhile, with so many fan-centric blockbuster films headed to theaters this season, which ones will actually be hits? Tiffany Smith (from Fandango’s WEEKEND TICKET and DC Comics’ ALL ACCESS) weighs in with a few scoops that just might change your opinions.

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Transcript

The Point Radio. Hey, it's Mike Roth. The second season of The Fiest has exploded on the SyFy Network. And with the characters all in such turmoil, well, where are things headed from here? We talked to Julie Bens about how her character starts out and where she just might end up

this season. Plus, with all the big summer blockbusters headed to the theaters, which ones are really going to make it? Fandango's fangirl Tiffany Smith says she has the answers, so we'll find out. Let's get to The Point.

This is The Point. The Point Radio. Get The Point Radio. The Fiance is back for a second season on The SyFy Network. And considering where things left off at the end of season one, most of the characters

are facing some pretty tough challenges, including Amanda, played by Julie Bens. She is very much on edge in being influenced by some not very positive forces. As an actress, it's exciting to play her right now at this stage of her life. Season one, Amanda was, you know, she was the optimist in the hopes for defiance. She was the idealist.

And we didn't get to see much of the dark side to her. In season two, we really get to explore her underbelly and all that darkness that exists within her. And I love that part. Things were hoping to see more of Julie's character interact with Nolan, played by Grant

Bolder. Will that happen or will the two characters end up at odds? Well, I mean, I think it's a bit of both. I mean, I think that they obviously have an attraction to each other and there's a familiarity with him from, you know, the world, because the world now has changed.

But now that he's back, there's it's almost like I've touched on to her sister in some ways. But I, you know, we do see their relationship evolve and change throughout the season. And I don't necessarily know. I think they're both too.

I think Nolan and Amanda are very damaged people that have a really hard time connecting. Will we ever see any of Amanda and her family's backstory? Yes, we do get to see and learn more about their past, a little bit about their past. And the whole journey for Amanda this season is trying to rebuild her life after Kenya's disappearance.

And through that, we definitely there's a lot more revealed about their past life. Julie said that the credit for the success of her character all belongs with the writers. I mean, I love how the writers have written all the women on the show as being extremely complex because that's how women really are in life. I love that Amanda can be so deeply flawed and especially this season, we really start

to see her flaws. But she's still the hero and we still root for her. And you don't see that very much in television. Women are still very much written as stereotypes, whether you know, the mother, the wife, the victim.

Men have a lot more leeway in television as characters where they can be flawed, but they're still, they can still be heroes. And that's what I really love about Amanda is I mean, she obviously has a drinking problem from last season. She loves her Scott.

She, this season, you know, has a little bit of a drug addiction as well. But yet we're still, you know, she's still the hope for the town. You still are rooting for her. You still want her to succeed. And she's still very capable of doing her job.

Same with all these dark issues that she's dealing with and struggling with. So I love just how fully rounded she is as a human being. She's not perfect at all. And she's, we don't have, she doesn't have to be perfect in order to be the hero. And how about that wardrobe change this season?

I love her wardrobe this year. It's nice to see her change it up a bit. Our costume designer, Semeneta, you know, she was definitely going for that kind of 1940s feel as well as with a little bit of blade runner kind of mixed into it. So, you know, it's interesting because a lot of the response to the veil that Amanda wears

has been that she's in mourning. But the veil is not representative of her in mourning. The veil is actually just part of her costume running the need wants and a way to kind of keep her distance, her eyes shielded from people as not to reveal, you know, her drug addiction and things like that.

It's kind of a way to kind of keep her mask on. It was interesting to me that the audience was thinking it was, she was in mourning because she's not in mourning. She doesn't know what's happened to Kenya. It's just her need want costume per se.

It's nice to change it up. And I love the choices that Semeneta made with Amanda's wardrobe this year. And the wardrobe gets better and better as the season progresses. New episodes of Defiance every Thursday on Sci-Fi and see more right now at Sci-Fi.com. There's plenty going on.

Here's the latest in pop culture. Boom Studios is continuing their association with the regular show property by releasing the very first original graphic novel based on it. It's called regular show hydration. It'll be in stores in September under the Kaboom imprint.

And it's written by Cartoon Network's Rachel Conner with art by Tessa Stone as well. The CW has announced plans that they will strategically roll out their new fall shows, avoiding the crush of all the both shows that debut in September that kind of overwhelm us at times. Vampire Diaries and Rain will be back on October the 2nd.

The Flash and Supernatural will debut on October the 7th. And the new season of Arrow arrives on the CW on Wednesday, October the 8th. The news is coming to Apple TV. ABC News is the first major news broadcaster to launch on the device which will include free hourly updates live with no pay subscription required.

It'll come from some of the network's bigger players like Good Morning America, Nightline in 2020. Also breaking news and updates from anywhere around the world where there's a current story. Stephen King novella Big Driver has been opted for a Lifetime TV movie. The project will have attached to it Maria Bello, Olympia Dukakis and rock and roller

Joan Jett. It's supposed to begin production over the summer and premiere later this year on Lifetime. Shane Black, the director of Iron Man 3 has now picked up the opportunity to reboot the Predator franchise for 20th Century Fox. Also involved with it will be Fred Decker who you remember as a writer of Monster Squad.

For a brief moment Black was originally attached to the beginning of Predator back in the 1980s when asked to rewrite the film however he turned that job down. It looks like Hulu has walked away from the table and will not be involved in reviving community for that season 6 that fans were hoping for. While Sony says they're still looking for a home for the series it looks pretty bleak

for any revival of community as contracts with most of the actors have pretty much just about expired. It's a great time to be a fan with so many action movies based on comics and a lot of our most familiar properties all headed into the theaters this summer. Everybody's got a concern about which one to invest their time and their ticket money

in. I sat down with Tiffany Smith co-host of Fandango's weekly ticket series and also the host of the DC Comics All Access show online as well. The first thing we talked about was whether or not Marvel's already got the summer locked down.

I think that we're going to get a lot of other good films but I will say Captain America Winter Soldier was such a breakout movie. It came out a little bit early but I'll say it this summer for the week but people were so excited and so surprised by that one because it wasn't just a Captain America movie it was a Captain America and Black Widow film.

So I think that you've got a different vibe than what we've got from some of the other Marvel films to date. I think that Guardians of the Galaxy has so much hype behind it and people are so excited to see something new again. This is the first time we're getting a teen film that most people don't have any idea

who the characters are. We've obviously got Billy Saldana playing Gamora who's the galaxy's deadliest assassin. You know I read all the comic books so I know a little bit of a backstory but you come in and you're like okay well Zoe Saldana who's played a blue character before. Now we're getting her playing a green character and then you throw in a raccoon and a tree

and you're like okay what is Marvel doing here? But you get a director like James Gunn who really gets it and really wants to play with the humor and you see a trailer for it and it's like the ahhhh and Chris Pratt and everybody's on board. So I think it is going to be a Marvel centric summer but there are going to be some standouts

alongside of those. You know I think Transformers is going to do incredibly well this summer. It almost feels like a reboot of the franchise because we've got a totally new cast and that's another one where it's like I grew up watching a cartoon so I'm really nostalgic and excited about seeing that one.

So what can we look for beyond Marvel? I think there are two pretty big maybe three breakouts this summer. I'm going to go with first Transformers Age of Extinction. We've got TJ Miller in the movie who's a comedian and I think that it's kind of a surprise where when we saw Shia LaBeouf in the first Transformers that snark in that whip that

I loved so much. I think you're getting it again in this movie especially with the interaction between TJ Miller and Mark Wahlberg. So I think that he's really going to be a standout in the movie for that film and then you go to Guardians of the Galaxy and I think people are going to be really surprised about

the character of Groot who is voice over by Vin Diesel from Fast and Furious. So you're not going to see his actual face on the big screen but you're going to hear his voice and the crazy thing is always going to say the whole movie is I am Groot and the director James Gunn just said you know he's never gotten so much incredible work out of an actor and it was above and beyond what he expected.

So I think we're going to be really surprised by that one and you know Scarlett Johansson, Lucy is coming out this summer. Everybody knows who she is but I think this is really going to be her breakout as an action hero, a headlining action hero. We kind of got a little bit of that like I said with Captain America but it's going to

be full force in that film. Alright so there's a special effects in the action but what about the stars of the movies? Any standout performances that she sees on the way? Yeah you know I think that for Donna the Planet of the Eight we're getting Andy Serkis back at Caesar.

We're getting Jason Clark who was a standout for me in Zero Dark Thirty and then he put in Keri Ruffo as well. These are actors who people associate with and know and know that they put their craft first. So I think that that's why in a movie like that where you've got something like Ace on

Horses could be a huge distraction from the acting being really incredible but you put in an actress like Keri Ruffo and I think she's really going to stand out and I think this is going to be kind of the first time we've seen her in somewhat more of an action role so I think she definitely is going to be a standout and you could even look to Tine Mutant Ninja Turtles with Megan Fox.

We haven't seen her really do action in a long time and it's the you know teaming up again with Michael Bay so I think she's going to stand out in that one as well. One movie does have fans concern that's Michael Bay's reboot of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. As a girl of the 90s I knew Tiffany had some investment in the Turtles and I was wondering if she thought well this might just be a little too dark.

You know for me I read the comic books first which are very dark so I'm kind of glad that they're taking it a little bit darker. I don't think it's going to be a film that alienates the fan base of the cartoon though either. I think it's one of the films that's going to be a great summer family movie.

You know it was cool because you hear about a lot of fans being like I was with the actors we're just wearing suits on set but these actors wore motion capture suits and then had life-size shells on their back and I said that was Megan Fox for San Diego's Weekend Ticket and she said you know trust me you are going to be so impressed when you see them on the big screen you don't want them in suits.

You really feel like they're actually there which I think is the biggest compliment for that movie. Tiffany told me that her love for all of this started at a pretty early age. I definitely wore a Wonder Woman costume quite often when I was little. You know I grew up just watching comics I mean reading comics and watching the cartoons

with my dad I started with X-Men and Spider-Man and you know my dad basically I think he was kind of like the pusher where he'd be like you like these cartoons how about you read these comic books because you can read them all the time. So that was really what got me started in that genre and then you know video games I just loved playing them Sonic the Hedgehog was probably one of the first games that I

played all the way through and I remember sneaking down into the basement and just playing all night because I loved it so much. So yeah I grew up really being into all that stuff and I think when it parlayed into movies you know fangirl you've got sci-fi fantasy action all of that is kind of under the same umbrella and I don't think there's any other genre where you can really explore humor and

romance and have a serious vibe all in the same genre so that's why I love it so much. And it comes down to the one movie she considers to be her all-time favorite. For me it definitely goes back to Lord of the Rings. Fellowship of the Ring is my absolute favorite if I have to pick one of them which is a difficult choice for me but you know getting to see all of those characters meet for the first time

and get the story that I'd read so many times because I grew up reading the books as well. I have an Elvis tattoo I'm that nerdy so that one is definitely the one that anytime it's on TV I can't turn it off I go back and rewatch it probably at least three times a year. See Tiffany every week online in Fandango's weekend ticket series and of course the DC Comics all-access series as well and don't forget Transformers Age of Extinction is already in theaters.

That does it for the podcast we're back in a few days but in the meantime keep up with pop culture 24-7 and get the point radio listen for free get the point radio.com is where you do that or take us along on your Apple or Android mobile device for free with the app called iNet Radio get that in your app store. The podcast is back and heard on websites like ComicMix.com and michael davisworld.com and we'll also turn up as we always do in the

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