12 new photos here plus we have loaded 48 photos in our gallery from the Heroes Season 3 Press Conference at the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills on Friday.

Season 2 DVDS go on sale this week on both regular DVD and Blu-Ray. Season 1 will also be coming out on Blu-Ray so this is the perfect time to upgrade your disks if you haven’t got them in High Definition.

You can still order on Amazon for delivery this week.

Watch this preview of the special features and a look at what is on the season 2 Heroes DVDS.

Here are 8 new promo photos for Episode 02×01 “Samson and Delilah” of TERMINATOR: THE SARAH CONNNOR CHRONICLES that airs 9/8/08 at 8PM on Fox. Shirley Manson just looks bad-ass, doesn’t she?

Click thumbs to enlarge or view them along w/ other TSCC promos in our gallery HERE!

We have 8 new pilot photos from the pilot of “Fringe.” I really like the one w/ John Nobel and Joshua Jackson, although Joshua Jackson didn’t overly impress me in my preview of the early leak of the Pilot  - I have to admit that casting him as John Nobel’s son is pure casting genius. Don’t they look remarkably alike?

Click thumbs to enlarge or view them HERE in our gallery!

While comic book aficionados wonder if Warner Bros. will release its controversial superhero flick Watchmen as scheduled next March, one famous fan of the groundbreaking graphic novel says he’s seen Zack Snyder’s $100 million opus, and judging from his reaction, it appears all the fuss the film has stirred up is worth it.

Clerks helmer Kevin Smith (pictured) — who apparently was invited to see the film at Snyder’s invitation shortly after Comic-Con last month — has posted an unabashed rave for Watchmen over at MySpace: “I saw Watchmen. It’s f—ing astounding. The Non-Disclosure Agreement I signed prevents me from saying much, but I can spout the following with complete joygasmic enthusiasm: Snyder and Co. have pulled it off. Remember that feeling of watching Sin City on the big screen and being blown away by what a faithful translation of the source material it was, in terms of both content and visuals? Triple that, and you’ll come close to watching Watchmen.”

Of course, depending on how you felt about Sin City, Smith’s assessment may or may not strike you as impressive. So EW.com asked Smith — currently prepping his R-rated lewd laugher Zack and Miri Make A Porno for a Halloween premiere — to expand just a smidge: “My God, the flick is amazing.” Okay. And? “Anything more and I start getting phone calls.” Fair enough.

Smith’s gush might be encouraging for those who’ve long doubted that even a good film could be distilled out of Watchmen’s dense, complex story, let alone one that’s “f—ing astounding.” But there is still reason to worry: as EW reported in July, Snyder is currently endeavoring to trim a nearly three-hour version of Watchmen (which is believed to be the iteration Smith saw) down to two hours and 25 minutes, the studio’s desired running time, even though Snyder’s preference is that the movie be released as long as possible.

Read the rest on EW

For all of you who went in to panic mode when you heard Stargate Atlantis would be wrapping their weekly series in January- there will be more Stargate to come! This is from THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

Network puts ‘Universe’ spinoff on 2009 launchpad

Sci Fi Channel isn’t about to let down “Stargate” fans.

The network is set to announce the order of a new series from MGM Television, “Stargate: Universe,” that will mark the third entry in Sci Fi’s longest-running original series franchise.

The green light comes on the heels of Sci Fi’s confirming Thursday that “Stargate: Atlantis” will not receive a sixth-season order. The “Universe” pickup ensures the continuation of the popular “Stargate” franchise, which has been on the air in various incarnations since 1997.

“Universe” will premiere as a two-hour movie early next year and will assume a regular hourly slot in the summer. Brad Wright and Robert Cooper, co-creators of “Stargate: SG-1″ and “Atlantis,” will serve as executive producers and writers on the new series.

The new show will involve more space-based action than “SG-1″ or “Atlantis.” With the “Star Trek” television franchise having folded in 2005 and Sci Fi’s “Battlestar Galactica” airing its final episodes next year, the network hopes “Universe” will become sci-fi fans’ new favorite space-travel series.

“We’ve had great success with ‘Enterprise’ repeats on Monday night, and there’s an appetite for space opera as ‘Battlestar’ goes away,” Sci Fi president Dave Howe said. “There’s an opportunity to keep the space opera as part of our programming strategy.”

“Universe” introduces a team of explorers who find an ancient unmanned ship called the Destiny. Unable to return to Earth, the crew must fend for themselves aboard the ship, which has a preprogramd mission taking them to the far reaches of the universe.

The series will employ a new cast of characters, with the network seeking a known performer for one lead role and fresh faces to play the rest of the ship’s crew. Appearances by former cast members from “SG-1″ and “Atlantis” are very possible.

Howe said the new series will reinvigorate the franchise by targeting a younger audience.

“This is an opportunity to reinvent this franchise and make it relevant to a new generation,” Howe said. “We really don’t want to be more of the same. It’s going to build clearly off the existing franchise but with a cast that gives it a younger vibe.”

Said co-creators Wright and Cooper: “In ‘Universe,’ we plan to keep those elements that have made the franchise a success, such as adventure and humor, while breaking new ground in the relationships between mostly young and desperate explorers, thrust together and far from home. Above all, we believe the Stargate itself remains an enduring icon with infinite potential as a jumping-off point for telling stories.”

Also on Thursday, Sci Fi announced an order for a two-hour “Atlantis” movie in lieu of a sixth-season order. Airing two-hour movies of such franchises as “Stargate” and “Galactica” and quickly releasing the films as stand-alone DVDs has been a successful strategy for the network. But the news depressed “Stargate” fans that the long-running sci-fi television franchise, like “Star Trek” a few years back, was going to be retired as a weekly series.

“SG-1″ ran for 10 seasons, launching on Showtime in 1997 then moving to Sci Fi after its fifth season. The spinoff “Atlantis” premiered in 2004 and will mark its 100th episode this year. Friday night airings of “Atlantis” have averaged more than 2 million viewers per episode.

Sci Fi has not yet made a decision which new project might serve as a companion for “Universe” next summer. The network has three pilots under consideration, including the terrestrial-bound “Battlestar Galactica” prequel “Caprica.”

Let’s start our Heroes update with 11 nice photos of the cast for season 3! See these HQ in our gallery.

NBC and Heroes creator Tim Kring really listened to the fans last season when they didn’t like the direction the show was taking- adding too many new people we didn’t feel connected to and not spending time developing the existing storylines to the extent that people really wanted to see. During the writer’s strike Kring spent a lot of time thinking about this so that when the strike was done the Heroes team went right back to the drawing board and talked about what they needed to do to get the series back on track. Producer Jeph Loeb who worked on Smallville during its peak seasons 1-4 was one of the key people in on the discussions.

Season 3 promises to present a tighter more focused mythology that will build the backstory of the Heroes as well as exploring their relationships to each other and showing us some surprising character development. The only new villain we have heard about so far is Hiro’s new nemesis- The Speedster. Ali Larter will be exploring a new personality for the multi-faceted and fractures Niki Sanders and her story will be entwined with Bruce Boxleitner whose story we have heard very little about- but he is the one in the chair in the trailer clips with Niki walking in wearing her lingerie.

Now here is the promo that ran this week during the Olympics that me so happy and illustrates the difference between NBC and some other networks who we have discussed in this blog. NBC ran this long big glossy promo featuring the showing of the first new episode of Heroes at Comic Con- and listen and watch the respect and thanks they give to their fans and the crowds. You will notice that on the NBC websites fans are never referred to as geeks and weirdos like some other news sources- but as valued viewers whose opinions matter.

Also showing this month on NBC is a special preview show that includes this AWESOME big clip fest from the latest about Heroes. Includes all of the clips we have been seeing plus a few new ones.

This is a great trailer- features Hiro meeting Daphne- aka the Speedster. Note that she wears red much like her DC Universe counterpart The Flash…..

SpoilerTv found a great article from the New York Times talking to the young actress who plays Monica- Micah’s cousin the Copycat. She is not going to be in the first episodes- but may be back later in the season, or in the next arc after villains. Remember- she is a Hero not a Villain in any way that we have seen.

Latest TV Guide Scans featuring Mohinder and Maya and Peter and Claire.

The good stuff keeps coming from NBC! We have 8 promo photos- all scaled down here available HQ in our gallery from the season premiere entitled “Chuck VS. the First Date”

Zachary Levi is one of the prominently featured NBC stars in their TIME TO CHIME campaign which incidentally drives my dogs bonkers as they bark every time they hear the chime thinking it is the doorbell…… Can you name all of the stars in the line up and their shows?

The 2008-2009 CW Unique Approach to Advertising “No News Is Good News?”

By Erika Blake
Chief Correspondent & Webmaster
Multipleverses.com

Tom Welling Advertising the CW from the 2006-2007 Season Ad Campaign

We’re weeks away from the brand new Fall season’s of everyone’s favorite returning and new shows to prime-time television. The networks are all out in full force promoting their Fall line-ups, NBC is spamming the airwaves during the Olympics with great promos for their entire line-up, Fox has just launched a new “So Fresh” website that highlights all of the fresh faces in their entire Fall line-up, and ABC has fun and quirky television Promos that are airing on its network.

So how about the CW? What is the lowest rated network they up to? In the past the CW/WB once held decent ratings on the 18-49 year old female viewership who religiously used to watch “Gilmore Girls,” “Veronica Mars,” and “Charmed.” Since the network systematically cancelled all 3 of these shows they’ve seen a dramatic loss in overall viewership to their network and have decided that they needed to court those viewers back this fall. They’re scrambling to try to get the attention of that fan base again by offering up a revamped version of “90210” and a new dramedy “Privileged” starring Anne Archer and a bevy of fresh faced unknowns to go along with their critically acclaimed, yet rarely viewed live “Gossip Girl.”

The network is counting on “90210” to pull it up out of its rating slump and keep the drowning network afloat long enough for it to come up with more original programming to try to broaden their demographics. The show has potential for enticing multi-generational viewings of the show; Moms and daughters can watch it side by side…so long as they care. The one saving grace that “90210” might have in its favor is that the nighttime soap is missing mostly from their competitor’s line-up and with original cast members Jennie Garth and Shannen Doherty on board to make appearances, they just might manage to turn a few “Desperate Housewives” fan’s heads in their direction.

This week the CW decided to hold back on sending out preview copies of the pilot for “90210” and is banking on good reviews when the show goes live. This could be a dangerous ploy for them – we can only assume that with the pressure from their parent companies CBS & WB to perform well and to raise their earnings that perhaps they’re hoping that having every critic in the country watching the first episode will help pad its 2 hour premiere night’s ratings. Frankly, I think allowing reviewers to view the finished product ahead of time, post reviews all over the web weeks before the show airs to give it massive pre-buzz all over the country would be a better option…however, that is just my opinion. By hiding it away, you have to worry that critics will worry that the CW is hiding a dog and is willing to wait for the bad reviews after the show’s premiere. Then again, perhaps they’re just editing the first episode up until the last minute and want to make sure that the final product rocks.

This Summer the CW gave a fresh new view of its new lineup at the Upfronts in New York City. They focused entirely on their brand new female driven shows. For the first time in eons the cast of “One Tree Hill” was prominently represented at the event to show to advertisers that the stable soap on the network was the cornerstone for them building out their new lineups. Ever since that show had grown up it has probably received the least amount of promotion of any of the CW’s shows. Their fans, btw rebelled against this, and “One Tree Hill” scored a handful of Teen Choice Awards this summer. This forced the network to remember that the WB carryover show does have a loyal fan following and should be promoted and they’ve been using the show’s cast members in some of their “go green” campaign advertisements.

Sam Witwer - Smallville's new Baddie Davis Bloom, Comic Con, PR Photos

After the Summer Upfronts where the CW gloriously promoted their new female focused shows, fans of the existing shows on the network were left scratching their heads wondering why the CW was suddenly acting as if their two highest rated scripted shows, “Smallville” and “Supernatural” don’t exist. Instead of presenting them to their advertisers they sent the producers and actors of the shows top promote their new seasons directly to their fans at San Diego Comic Con. Both “Supernatural” and “Smallville” packed the third largest halls at Comic Con with fans hungry for news about their 2 favorite shows. Since then, however, fans have had to scrape for anything that resembles news for either show and have been harassing new scoops Kristin on E!, Matt Mitovich at TV Guide, and Michael Ausiello at Entertainment Weekly for anything concerning their favorite shows. Early in the summer, prior to Comic Con, the CW posted the incorrect premiere date for “Smallville” during its repeat episode’s and so far has done nothing to actively correct that mistake. Many fans are still confused over when exactly it’s supposed to air (which BTW is Sept. 18^th) the network has this posted on their website but haven’t mentioned it on air.

Ignoring “Smallville” has to be the dumbest move that the network can pull. In recent years its viewership has been rocky, mostly due to the unevenness of the show’s story arcs and huge time gaps in the winter between new episodes. Since the CW rarely promotes “Smallville” or “Supernatural” except during their first run episodes, casual viewers never had any idea when the shows were returning after long rerun hiatuses. Now that former head show executive producers Millar and Gough are gone, the new head production team of “Smallville” seem energized to drive the show forward towards the mythos of “Superman.” In this the 70^th anniversary of SUPERMAN, wouldn’t you think that their publicity department would want to announce to the world the exciting changes that are in store for fans this season? How do these sound for headlines to you?

• · CLARK KENT GETS JOB AT THE DAILY PLANET AND IS PAIRED WITH LOIS LANE
• · GREEN ARROW STRUGGLES WITH INNER DEMONS AS JUSTIN HARTLEY JOINS THE CAST AS A FULL-TIME CAST MEMBER.
• · THE JUSTICE LEAGUE BONDS TOGETHER TO FIND THEIR MISSING FRIEND CLARK KENT IN SEASON OPENER.
• · DOOMSDAY JOINS THE SHOW
• · DC COMICS HEAD WRITER GEOFF JOHNS TO WRITE “LEGION” – AN EPISODE SURROUNDING THE LEGION OF SUPERHEROES – NEVER DONE ON FILM.

I suppose one could argue that there have been news-stories about these headlines and that this was all news that came out of Comic Con; however, how many casual fans actually pay attention to “Smallville” news during the summer? In a recent copy of ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY they posted which shows on what networks had the highest age demographics. The show with the oldest viewers on the CW was “Smallville” and the average age was listed at 38. I got to attend Comic Con and I can safely tell you that after examining the crowd that stood outside to get into the panel, I think that number is generously low, there were far more folks in that hall who had white and grey in their hair than those who had green streaks and nose piercings.

Realizing that the show’s demographics are that much older the CW should be actively pursuing bigger revenue generating advertisers who can cater to the older audience who has more disposable income to burn – they could sell beer, car, and computer ads during the show. Instead they usually go after the cell phone crowd and fast food advertisers which cater to the lower income teenage crowd.

Jensen Ackles from Supernatural at Comic Con - WireImage

As of today the CW has not shown a single season 8 promo video on air for “Smallville” or “Supernatural” even though the producers from both shows presented the crowds with several minutes of new footage at Comic Con. Contrast that to FOX who immediately snatched up the footage that Josh Friedman and his merry band of spoiler loathing producers aired in the “Terminator: the Sarah Connor Chronicles” panel and immediately started inserting those clips into their almost daily on air campaign to promote their high rated sophomore year show.

For those of us who got to see the “Smallville” montage it absolutely electrocuted the crowd, the style of the way the show is being shot has changed – the warm sunny quality that you expect from the show has been replaced with more icy blue tones as the show moves away from Smallville towards Metropolis. The new villainous characters who were introduced were given ominous introductions, including a terrifying close-up of new mega villain Davis Bloom, aka Doomsday, who will test Clark to his breaking point. Clark Kent ends one career as a farm boy and begins his journey towards becoming the man we all know and love who leads duel lives as the mild mannered reporter by day and Superhero at night. This season he is paired with Lois Lane and the producers promise us that the big payoff for Superman fans is coming. These are wildly exciting changes after the show has been mired by constantly focusing on Clark Kent’s unwillingness to get off of the farm and grow up. This was fantastic news…for the 2,000 people who attended the event and got to see the footage. However, with only a fraction of their viewing audience in attendance and strict “no recording” rules in place at the panels for network footage, the general public has yet to see any new footage to entice them to watch the new season.

“Smallville” is eight years old, I guess it’s understandable that the network would rather splash young faces all over their website and TV ads and not bother investing in the aging Superhero show. Normal networks can afford to ignore their older shows, the CW cannot. “Smallville” might be old, but it IS the NUMBER ONE scripted show on their network and continues to bring in ratings, even when the show’s storylines don’t appeal to the action hounds who are the cornerstone of Sci-Fi TV viewership. With the storylines that the producers are promising for this season, “Smallville” FINALLY seems to be getting off of the teenage-sappy-soap filled storylines and is moving towards focusing entirely on superhero/comic book lore, this was met with thunderous applause by the Comic Con crowd. The show has the possibility, just like they did in season 6 to bring the fan boys back to the show, and when they’re on board, the ratings skyrocket.

Season 6 was the last time that “Smallville” received any real money sent its way for a full marketing campaign – and it paid off – they gave us fresh new promo photos, posters, and commercials. The show averaged between 5-6 million viewers for the first half of the season with a high of 6.5 for the critically acclaimed episode “Justice.” However, almost immediately after that episode aired the show again shifted focus away from the Superhero storylines that were driven by Clark working with the Green Arrow and Lois Lane and again the ratings tanked as it bounced back into soap territory.

So far we haven’t seen any new cast promos surface other than some laughably bad photoshopped manips of Clark using ancient photos at Comic Con. They have two brand new cast members who are being added as regular cast members and we haven’t seen any new photos of them, whereas last year we were spammed with new photos of pretty Laura Vandervoort as Supergirl. With Lex Luthor gone this year, you would think that promoting the new big bad guy on the show would be a priority to the network. As things stand we haven’t had any of the stars out talking on the radio or anything to promote the show and again NO commercials advertising the new season. The only coverage we received was at Comic Con and that news is now stale. People who are interested in the fall shows will look for news wherever they can find it and so far “Smallville” and “Supernatural” don’t even factor as mentionable stories.

“Supernatural” which steadily holds solid ratings is in an even worse boat than its eight o’clock lead in – they didn’t get any sort of promotion at Comic Con beyond the panel, however, at least we’ve seen some promo photos surface for their premiere episode. This is unbelievable considering both Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki manage to always top the charts for hottest male actors in nearly any online poll that they are a part of, you’d think that the network would want to steal from its British distributors tagline and ask “Since when did scary get sexy?” Wouldn’t you think promoting that the network lays claim to two of the hottest men on TV would be an easy selling point to new viewers of their female shows? I mean, women watch “Desperate Housewives” for the stories & writing right? Why not tease them into the scare-fest family drama with their hunk stars and lure them in with the shows great writing and unique stories?

From Comic Con the “Supernatural” panel received recognition for having some of the most passionate and obnoxiously loud fans from the entire event and just like the “Smallville” panel which proceeded it, the room was packed. Executive Producer Eric Kripke announced that “Supernatural” would have a spin-off of sorts “Ghostfacers” which will likely air online – if you spend time digging around the CW site you can find THIS PAGE that is dedicated to explaining who they are, but you have to be a detective to locate it, there certainly hasn’t been any official CW releases about it launching.

Neither “Smallville” or “Supernatural” have any new promotional posters, photos, or videos promoting their shows. Instead they’re lumped into a couple of network focused video ads where the 2 shows are afterthoughts and buried under tons of images of smiling teenagers. The only artwork on the main site for both shows is sorely out of date. For “Smallville” all images center around Clark/Lex/Lana – even though Lana and Lex are gone as regular cast members. The CW just added new season wallpapers for both shows onto their sites and they’re using promo photos for the “Smallville” art that are FOUR years old and the ones for “Supernatural” are TWO years old.

This whole CW mess makes you wonder if anyone over there actually THINKS. Or even better yet, why isn’t the CW working hard with their two parent companies to come up with a diverse solid line-up? CBS fought for and eventually killed fan favorite show “Jericho” which routinely held between 4-5 million viewers a week. Those numbers suck for a show staying alive on one of the big four networks, but not for the CW. Those numbers would’ve brought much needed new viewers to their network and the show would’ve fit nicely either with “Supernatural” or “Reaper.” Same could be said for “Moonlight” – it could’ve been sent to the CW and flourished when paired with their sci-fi focused shows.

As things currently stand, the 3-6 million viewers who watch the more action oriented programming on the network feel resentful that the established shows are being ignored and overlooked by the new up and comers. Had the CW bothered to put out even the smallest campaigns for their two top shows, the viewers on them might feel interested to check out their newer offerings, as it stands on the nights that their new shows are airing, I doubt many “Smallville” or “Supernatural” fans will give the CW’s other show’s a second glance…even the females. Once upon a time the CW/WB had balanced programming – now their line-up is confusing and it makes you wonder who decides where to put things. Why would they throw their two highest rated shows on the toughest night of Television? Why not throw their reality programming there instead and reap the benefits of moving “Smallville” and “Supernatural” to say…Wednesday when there’s very little else on for real competition and allow for them to get higher live ratings which is what the advertisers prefer? Both shows are heavily DVRed which helps to further pad their overall numbers.

I guess we’ll never know the powers that be at the CW plan and decide things and I suppose that they must believe that devoted fans of the shows that they fail to promote will find news on their own. Why put money into advertising when your fans will do it for you for free? In that case, I guess they must be thinking that no news is good news for them.

I wonder if they’ll still think that if “90210” tanks and the network folds this year.

Many of you have written to me to express your disappointment in our moving Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince to Summer 2009.

Please be assured that we share your love for Harry Potter and would certainly never do anything to hurt any of the films. Over the past 10 years, we have nurtured and protected each film, and the integrity of the books upon which they are based, to the best of our ability.

The decision to move Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince was not taken lightly, and was never intended to upset our Harry Potter fans. We know you have built this series into what it is, and we thank you for your ongoing enthusiasm and support.

If I may offer a silver lining: there would have been a two-year gap between Half-Blood Prince and the much-anticipated first part of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which opens in November 2010.

So although we have to wait a little longer for Half-Blood Prince, the wait from that film until Deathly Hallows will be less than 18 months. I am sorry to have disappointed you now, but if you hold on a little longer, I believe it will be worth the wait.

Alan Horn
President, Chief Operating Officer
Warner Bros.
Source: IGN