Steven Moffat: John Hurt — FTW!

What he did he did without choice, in the name of peace and sanity. But what did he do? He upstaged his co-stars!

We’ve heard that Matt Smith and David Tennant got on like a house afire while making the DOCTOR WHO anniversary story “The Day of the Doctor,” but how did newbie John Hurt fit in?

According to executive producer and writer Steven Moffat, as quoted by Radio Times, the Hurt Doctor stole the show:

“It was great fun. You’d have David and Matt, they’d be leaping around the set and doing every form of physical comedy with each other – and, you know, slightly competing about who could be slightly more insane than the other – and then John Hurt would come along and do this [tiny movement] with his eyes and you go ‘That’s it – he’s got the scene now, hasn’t he?’

John was delightful – delightfully grumpy in every single way. During our last meal [while filming] he got grumpy about the fact that he liked the wine! He’s not actually grumpy, he’s actually a really, really lovely man.”

AMERICAN HORROR STORY: COVEN 3.3: “The Replacements”

It must be difficult for Jessica Lange to choose two shows for her Emmy reel each year because she has so many terrific performances from AMERICAN HORROR STORY to consider, but I think her work this year just got 50 percent easier: This episode absolutely has to be submitted, because we got to see sweet-and-sour Fiona at her finest.

Who are the eponymous Replacements? Take your pick: Madison is Fiona’s replacement; Queenie is Delphine’s replacement; the patchwork Kyle is his own replacement; Alicia thinks Kyle is a replacement for her husband; and Cordelia is unable to create her own replacement.

AGENTS OF SHIELD 1.5: “Girl in the Flower Dress”

One of the things I find most interesting about MARVEL’S AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D. is the way episodes hinge on decisions that Agent Coulson has to make, as opposed to a shoot-out or some other action set piece. Whether it’s choosing to let Skye tag along with his team from the pilot or a life-or-death decision about the person his team was chasing. And he makes these choices on the spot, and rather coldly and without sentiment. I like that he takes his job seriously and is willing to make the tough calls.

Those of you keeping score at home know Coulson sometimes gives the prey the benefit of the doubt — Skye and Akela   — but sometimes doesn’t — just ask Dr. Franklin. I find that the most interesting aspect of this show, which isn’t always all that interesting. After all the action and chases and hand-to-hand combat, Coulson usually has a split-second to weigh the life of a bad or dangerous person against the lives of his team (or the safety of the world), and he doesn’t let sentimentality get in the way. (Or would Akela disagree, even though she benefitted from it?)

First Uncanny Trailer for X-Men: Days of Future Past

Looks like director Bryan Singer and X-Men: Days of Future Past have taken up the gauntlet cast down by Captain America: The Winter Soldier and turned out a pretty amazing trailer.

Yes, it’s Bryan Singer and the X-Men. All of them. In the immortal words of Stan Lee: ’Nuff said!

‘Final’ Trailer for ‘Catching Fire’ Looks Pretty Hot

If you’re like me and you hate the Boston Red Sox with the fiery passion of 10,000 suns (or maybe you just don’t like baseball), then you also weren’t watching the World Series last night when Lionsgate unveiled what it’s calling the “final trailer” for The Hunger Games: Catching Fire.

It’s the best trailer so far because it actually contains some footage from the arena for the very first time. It would be a shame to miss it, so here it is:

Sadly, the new fan favorite (and mine) from the novel, Johanna Mason (Jena Malone), is hardly in it — she can be glimpsed at the 0:57 mark, over Peeta’s left shoulder as he’s talking to Katniss.

The other novel fan fave, Finnick Odair (Sam Claflin), and Mags (Lynn Cohen) are just barely recognizable at the 0:46 mark, running through the jungle.

The Midnight Coterie of Sinister Intruders

Saturday Night Live has been so hit-and-miss for the last few decades years that it’s easy to forget to watch, but I remembered that Edward Norton was hosting this weekend, so I made sure to watch. (I’ve found something to like in each episode this season, including the overpraised Tina Fey and overly despised Miley Cyrus and Bruce Willis installments.)

The best thing about this week’s episode was also by far the best thing about this entire season so far: the dead-on pastiche of director Wes Anderson’s  highly mannered filmmaking style, called The Midnight Coterie of Sinister Intruders. Watch:

Everything about this was perfect, from Norton’s wonderful Owen Wilson impression to Kate McKinnon’s Tilda Swinton to the sets and Alec Baldwin as the turtleneck-wearing Narrator. If you’ve never seen a Wes Anderson film before, well, you’ve just seen one. It’s a shame this isn’t a real movie…

Will SLEEPY HOLLOW Rue the Day?

When SLEEPY HOLLOW returns to Fox Nov. 4 after World Series coverage, FRINGE veteran John Noble will make his first guest appearance,  and then on Nov. 25, the cast will grow again, when Jill Marie Jones and Amandla Stenberg begin recurring as Lt. Frank Irving’s wife and daughter.

Jones will play Cynthia, the ex-wife of Irving, who is portrayed by Orlando Jones. Stenberg will play their teen daughter, Macey. You will probably remember Stenberg as the adorable Rue in last year’s The Hunger Games movie — but no word on whether her character on SH will also be adorable. Early indications are that she feels “disconnected” from her father since he started working in Sleepy Hollow, N.Y.

Noble — beloved by fans as FRINGE’s loopy Walter Bishop — will recur on SH as Henry Parrish, a man with supernatural powers who may hold the key to severing Ichabod’s blood connection to the Headless Horseman.

THE WALKING DEAD 4.2: “Infected”

Not even a week after I expressed my disdain for “contagion” storylines (while discussing SLEEPY HOLLOW) what does THE WALKING DEAD do? It plays the contagion card. And worse, it looks like this will be a major plot thread for the foreseeable future.

I just don’t buy into the inevitable course of infections in these storylines — the path of the disease is clearly dictated by storytelling needs. Somebody once said that we are much more forgiving of amazing coincidences in real life than we are in fiction, so it’s best to not put any coincidences in your story, but if you must, keep it to just one. And it’s always the most dramatically interesting people who get infected in these stories. It happens too often to be coincidence.

Moffat Nixed a Smith & Tennant Season!

If you had a chance to greenlight a season of DOCTOR WHO that featured both Matt Smith as the 11^th Doctor and David Tennant as the 10^th at the same time, would you do it?

It appears that DW executive producer Steven Moffat had such a chance — and vetoed the idea of a season featuring individual stories for each Doctor and three team-ups!

The idea came up during production of “The Day of the Doctor,” when Smith and Tennant were thick as thieves. Moffat tells the story:

“They got on like a couple of old women. They just stayed in the corner and gossiped the entire time. By the end of it, Matt told me that he’d worked out a plan that they’d both continue in DOCTOR WHO: ‘Do five individual episodes each and three together – would that be okay?’ It was a nice plan. I think if I had said yes they’d have gone for it.”

Wow, my mind boggles at the possibilities of a shared Doctor season — especially with these two iconic and strongly delineated Doctors.  Moffat was probably too far along with development of series eight, and Peter Capaldi was already on his way, so Moffat probably thought it best not to push things back an entire year.

But… still… another year of Smith? Another year of Tennant? Fangasm!

First Trailer From ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’

Following the release earlier this week of the most majestic (and ass-kicking) teaser poster of 2013, we at last get a glimpse into the sequel to 2011’s Captain America: The First Avenger in spring’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier. I really like this clip because it seems to give a taste of what the movie will be like overall: Some character banter, some politics and a whole lot of jaw-dropping action. What I’m excited about is the film seems to treat Cap (Chris Evans) with the reverence he deserves.

It looks like the Black Widow will have a more significant role than originally rumored — but who’s going to complain about more Scarlett Johansson? We also got a glimpse of Anthony Mackie as both Sam Wilson and the Falcon in action! Of course Sam Jackson is Sam Jackson, but Robert Redford appears to fit right in as Alexander Pierce, the head of S.H.I.E.L.D.

I get more and more psyched for this movie the closer we get to April 2014.