Tagged: Captain Jack

New Who Companion To Be Selected “Idol”-Style

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Riding the wave of major West End productions being cast by popular vote on television, the BBC announced today that the next co-star for the popular science-fiction program Doctor Who will be selected on a new reality show talent competition.

The show, “No Xenon Impact” (An anagram of “Next Companion”) will be executive produced by Caro Skinner and Andrew Lloyd Webber, based on the format of his reality show “How do you solve a problem like Maria?“, which cast the lead of the Sound of Music revival. The show will be co-hosted by John “Captain Jack” Barrowman and long-time Doctor Who fan and guest-star David Walliams.

DW Showrunner Steven Moffat admitted he was first “hesitant” at the idea, but admitted “It gives the show a mad new challenge – The Doctor never knows who his new friends will be, and now neither will we.”

The show will premiere on May 25th, a week after the second half of the current series of Doctor Who ends, and will run for six weeks.  Contestants (eight female, four male) will be drilled weekly on their acting and improv skill, their knowledge of the program, and what Walliams describes as “A whole lot of running.” Contestants will be voted on weekly by the viewing audience, and a different “guest alien” who “Exterminate” one or two hopefuls live on the program. Matt Smith and current companion (already confirmed to be returning for the eighth series) Jenna-Louise Coleman have agreed to appear for the series finale, where Matt will present a key to the TARDIS to the lucky winner.

Filming for the new eighth series of Doctor Who has yet to be scheduled; it is believed by many that this competition has been in the planning for some time, and the eighth series production has been scheduled to accommodate it.

Titan Launches ‘Torchwood’ Comic

torchwoodlg-jpg-2015808In addition to the ongoing audio dramas and original novels, the adventures of Captain Jack and the Torchwood crew are coming to comic books. Titan Publishing, which already handles the Torchwood magazine, will release a comic in August.

Two stories will appear, the first, “Captain Jack and the Selkie”, is being co-written by series star John Barrowman and his sister Carol E. Barrowman,. Handling the art is veteran Tommy Lee Edwards and Jonathan Ross. The second story, “Broken,” is the opening chapter to a five-part story, written by Torchwood script editor Gary Russell, with artwork by UK vet Adrian Salmon. Captain Jack, Gwen and Ianto (seemingly back from the dead) get trapped in a cosmic hotel, while an old villain from the TV series will return.

As one might expect, there will be variant covers – artwork by Ian Churchill or photography – for collectors with an exclusively edition, with different Churchill artwork available at July’s Comic-Con International.

Edwards told the Pink Paper his story “sees Barrowman facing a deadly threat on a remote Scottish island, where people are disappearing one by one. To his horror, the captain starts to suspect he may know who, or rather what, is responsible.” The artist came to Barrowman’s attention when he and Carole spotted a Captain Jack poster by Edwards at the 2008 San Diego-based convention.

“The four of us hit it off immediately and I asked if they’d ever be interested in working with us on a Captain Jack project. They thought about it for, oh, about 30 seconds, and ‘Captain Jack and the Selkie’ was born!”

Barrowman, who was seen this season on ABC’s Desperate Housewives, confirmed for BBC Radio 2 that the highly-anticipated fourth season of Torchwood will be a thirteen-episode affair, although no formal announcement or schedule has come from the BBC itself. Producer Russell T. Davies has previously indicated he knows exactly how he wanted to open the season, which would find Jack still off Earth while Gwen and Rhys welcomed their first child.

In the meantime, Barrowman is committed to appear in a production of Aladdin in Glasgow, at the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre’s Clyde Auditorium from December 11 to January 9, 2011.

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Barrowman Warns ‘Torchwood’ Season 3 Softened for America

John Barrowman told the British press that season three of Torchwood, the five-part "Children of the Earth", was being slightly toned down out of concern for its American viewers.

"The next series is about Torchwood fighting the government rather than just aliens and is a lot darker,” Barrowman said. “Jack has to make a decision no parent – that’s a big hint — should have to make.

"We’re not swearing or doing anything close to the bone because it’s been a huge success in the US and the networks won’t accept it with all that stuff in it."

The actor, known for dropping trou at a moment’s notice, reassured listeners that "I’ll still be getting naked and it will still be saucy – but it’s done with taste. We’ll doing everything so it doesn’t have to be heavily edited for the US."

Barrowman added, "I love playing Captain Jack and if I could play him until I’m 90, I would. But I’d rather do a series of 10 or 13 episodes because it’s a lot of work for just five.”

Johnny Depp Returns as Captain Jack…and Tonto

A fourth Pirates of the Caribbean movie seemed unlikely as every plot thread got neatly wrapped up and the escalating costs associated with making the films seemed unwieldy.  And yet, on Wednesday, Disney stunned the entertainment world by not only announcing a fourth installment of the franchise but that Johnny Depp will be back as Capotain Jack Sparrow.

Depp, already committed to playing the Mad Hatter for Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland 3-D project, was then announced as playing Tonto in a feature film adaptation of The Lone Ranger. Both Pirates and the Ranger films will be produced for the studio by Jerry Bruckheimer.

Depp took the stage in full Captain Jack regalia but people were at first puzzled as to why he was wearing a Lone Ranger mask until the announcement was made.

Additionally, Bruckheimer will be producing the unnecessary third film in the National Treasure franchise.
 

Torchwood Season 3 – Longer and Shorter

Well, I guess all the upheavals at the end of the second season of Torchwood sure made fans curious about what’s going to happen next season. The fact is, to steal an award-winning word from the next executive producer of daddy-series Doctor Who, if you blink, you might miss it.

Season three, scheduled to air around January of next year, will consist of one long, continuous story written, at least in part, by creator/producer Russell T. Davies. That’s the good news.

The bad news is, this story will only run five episodes. Given the unpredictability of BBC-TV runtimes, that means as far as 2009 is concerned we’re probably only going to get about four and one-half hours of Torchwood

Captain Jack, however, will be playing a prominent role in the last several parts of this season’s Doctor Who, as will Torchwood’s U.N.I.T.-affiliated Doctor Jones. As for the Captain’s appearances in the series of Who specials set for 2009… dare I say it… time will tell.

Torchwood Two Sports James Marsters, Freema Agyeman

Torchwood, the more adult brother to Doctor Who, will be returning to the airwaves on Wednesday, January 16th for another 13 episode run.

To the BBC in the United Kingdom, of course. Its North American debuts will happen… later.

Buffy’s James Marsters (well, also Smallville’s James Marsters and Without A Trace’s James Marsters) is set to become the series’ main villain, a rogue Time Agent named Captain (!) John Hart. As promised, Freema Agyeman will drop by for several episodes mid-season in her role as The Doctor’s companion Martha Jones. After her Torchwood stint, Martha will be returning to Doctor Who to team up with several other companions, present and past. And Torchwood star John Barrowman is expected to be around for the finale to next season’s Doctor Who as well.

But first, Captain Jack must survive Captain John, as well as a slew of other menaces as they "visit" such times as World War I and the 51th Century.

 

Martha Jones to chase Captain Jack?

agyemf0-1506390Over at Doctor Who, Martha Jones, the tenth Doctor’s second companion, is getting tired of unrequited love. Next season, she’s starting to look at everybody’s favorite object of lust, Torchwood‘s Captain Jack Harkness.

It seems Captain Jack has been working his sexual magic on the latest companion. According to the London Daily Mirror, when the 30th season of Doctor Who goes up next year, Martha will not be in all episodes – but will pick up the slack by appearing in a number of episodes of Torchwood. A new companion will join the cast of the former series, and Martha will not be in this year’s Christmas special. However, singer Kylie Minogue will co-star in the latter event.

The 29th season of Doctor Who ends in Britain tomorrow with the last of the three-part battle with The Master (John Simm, star of Life On Mars). This season is already being broadcast in many parts of the world, including Australia and Canada; it goes up in the United States on the SciFi Network a week from today.