TV – Blogaholics

My Gilmore Girls Experience

Posted in Blogging, Professional Blogging, Social networking, TV

Since Gilmore Girls closed its final episode in May, you would think that my Gilmore Girls site would have all but disappeared. Quite the opposite. At the end of the show, I was nearing a million monthly pageviews. Not bad, hey? Well, it went down from that slowly each month, as you’d expect… but now it’s going back up.

I think I am enjoying the site more now than I ever have before. The community that stuck around is fantastic – supportive, interactive, and insightful. The end of the show has challenged me to explore a lot of new ways to develop a television fansite.

As soon as the show ended, I took stock of my categories and completely rehauled them to reflect things I wanted to improve my SEO on: actor names, shows they are in, etc. While my focus was before fairly broad, I made it an aim to seek out a lot of information rather than passively writing what’s in the news.

I started a fun trivia category, dig around for what all the actors are up to, and come up with fun posts about the show – like my Oy with the poodles already post. I have also been, since some time in November, recapping Gilmore Girls from its pilot episode onward every weekday to coincide with its airing on ABC Family – so 5 Gilmore Girls episodes a week. We all watch the episodes together and I tack on some discussion questions to my recap post. It takes a long time to do (at least 2 hours per recap), but I actually look forward to that part of my day. The early seasons of Gilmore Girls were the best ones, and I always feel good after watching an episode.

I provide regular recaps of Aliens in America (with Scott Patterson) and Samantha Who? (with Melissa McCarthy), as well as recaps of any guest spots. Right now, for example, Matt Czuchry is doing a guest arc on Friday Night Lights. I have been contacted by more publicists now than ever before, so I have been able to promote a lot of exclusive stuff and run some great contests.

The whole experience has taught me the value of community and how that community will stick by you, and indeed grow, if you support them and share with them. It has been a great experience, and I love writing this site probably more than any other. And it doesn’t hurt that it’s still one of the largest blogs in b5 ;)

Now, off to watch another episode – we’re mid way through Season 3 now. Stay tuned here if you want to read them.

Tags: gilmore girls, gilmoregirlsnews, b5, tv blogging, community

Posted by arieanna on January 31, 2008
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Stargate: an intro and some news

Posted in Movies, TV

Stargate SG-1 has been a staple in our house for some months. Particularly during the holidays, we have relied on Stargate SG-1 to entertain us. We came to know the series too late in the game, and thus decided to start from the beginning. We are now in Season 7 out of the 10 associated with SG-1 (Stargate SG-1 – The Complete Series Collection ). It has ranked up there as one of my all-time favorite shows. It is self-referential, witty in unexpected ways, sardonic, and the characters all have strong and believable personalities. Never get enough of the eyebrow arch or the "indeed" from Teal’c.

Stargate SG-1 (filmed in Vancouver) chronicles 1997-2007 and a spinoff show, Stargate Atlantis, covers 2004-2014 (we haven’t even started on these). In March of this year, an SG-1 film, entitled ‘Stargate – The Ark of Truth’ will be released to DVD (preorder available). At least one other SG-1 film, ‘Stargate: Continuum’, is scheduled.

However, this is not the end. Ianiv poked around Wikipedia and found that a third Stargate television series is expected:

Stargate Universe is the working title for a third Stargate series which is currently in development. According to producer Robert C. Cooper, the concept will revolve around the ninth chevron on the Stargate. It is on track to premiere in 2008.

Of course, this is not new news. But it is new to us, as we’re still exploring the Stargate universe. And it’s exciting. We absolutely love the show. Here are some of our favorite quotes:

Jack O’Neill asks Teal’c which hockey team he supports, to which Teal’c replies: "I believe the Canucks of Vancouver are formidable warriors"
Jack O’Neill whines that the SGC won’t accept his name for the new ship, to which Carter replies: "Yeah, sir, we can’t call it the Enterprise."
Disturbed to see Teal’c, a native says: "He is Jaffa." to which O’Neill replies:
"No, but he plays one on TV."

The comedy comes out in ways you just can’t always capture by quote. It’s subtle. Like Major Carter humming the SG-1 theme song. The subtle hat tips to Vancouver. Teal’c’s facial expressions. For those of you who’ve seen the show, you’ll know what we mean.

Tags: stargate, sg1, stargate series, stargate tv, stargate universe, stargate movies, stargate humor, television, scifi, science fiction

Posted by arieanna on January 7, 2008
1 Comment »

New Apple Claymation

Posted in Marketing, Movies, TV

The latest Apple commercial is a Christmas-themed spoof of one of my all-time favorite Christmas movies: the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer Claymation from The Original Christmas Classics.

In the 1964 Christmas story features an outcast reindeer and wanna-be dentist elf who run away together – run into the Abominable Snowman, find an island of misfit toys, to which Rudolph eventually leads the way for Santa’s sleigh.

In the Mac spoof, a desperate PC bastardizes the holiday classic, "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" to encourage people to buy a PC and not a Mac – to which the Mac and Santa look on disapprovingly. Though it’s not a story spoof, it’s incredibly clear where the inspiration for these characters came from!

The Apple: Get a Mac Santa Ad is shown below:

The classics DVD features Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town, Frosty the Snowman, Frosty Returns, Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol, Little Drummer Boy, Cricket on the Hearth)

Tags: claymation, christmas movies, christmas classic, apple ad, mac, apple mac, commercial, advertisement, mac santa ad, santa commercial, rudolph the red nosed reindeer

Posted by arieanna on December 19, 2007
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Writers Guild Strike

Posted in TV

There has been a strike looming from the Writers Guild of America for several weeks now, and word has it that the strike could start as early as Monday.

In a lively meeting of 3,000 guild members Thursday night, the WGA’s negotiating committee announced its unanimous strike recommendation, a pronouncement that generated an enthusiastic response from the SRO crowd at the Los Angeles Convention Center. The decision also is sure to cause ripple effects within the Directors Guild and the Screen Actors Guild as they negotiate their contracts within coming months.

Knowing it was coming, many networks have accelerated their filming scheduled and prepared more episodes to fill the gap. Others have alternate programming planned. The most immediate impact will come to areas such as late night television, where scripting cannot be done in advance.

Although networks are predicting the impact to be minimal, for television fans, it could be quite a hit. Heroes, for example, may end half a season early. A season finale is being shot for a mid-season cut, if needed.

Sources confirm that the show is going back and shooting an alternate ending to the Dec. 3 episode that, if used, would allow the episode to function as a season finale in the event of a strike. Originally, the episode was only supposed to serve as the conclusion of the current "Generations" arc. Should an 11th-hour agreement be reached and a strike averted (fingers crossed!), the alt ending would likely be scrapped.

Via variety Tags: tv, tv strike, writers guild, wga, tv writers, strike, writers guild strike

Posted by arieanna on November 2, 2007
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Fall TV torrents leaked

Posted in Marketing, TV

A number of networks have chosen to embrace – at least temporarily – file sharing in order to build buzz for shows premiering this Fall.

Despite how quickly they’d sue you for doing the same thing with any other episode of their show, the networks have chosen to leak the pilot episodes onto the web. Ok, with the exception of Pushing Daisies – that one was leaked by an executive without the permission of the marketing team. Oh well.

If you search Google, you will easily find torrents for some of the most promising shows of the fall:

Pushing Daisies – watched it, loved it. LOVED it.
Bionic Woman
Reaper
The Sarah Connor Chronicles

And many more. Those are the ones I was most curious about, and I have yet to watch the last 3. From my perspective, this gives me the opportunity to consider shows more closely as being in line with my b5 strategy. Although I have jumped into several Fall shows already with blogs, the above shows are still not tapped.

All shows above have been very high on my radar. If I saw something in them after the premiere, I’d need to turn around a blog design & install very quickly in the new season. Seeing them early could help me make these decisions sooner. Of course, ratings are the final key element, but I am pretty sure all 4 of the above shows will do very well this Fall already. I just need to determine their "bloggability".

For those of you interested, Pushing Daisies is a new hybrid show, specifically a drama-romantic-comedy. It is, by far, the most highly anticipated show this Fall. It had all the critics just raving after the Fall press tour. The pilot, I can say, is amazing. It is not so narrowly defined as other shows. There is crime-solving, forbidden love, and also a light comic side. Like the cartoon elements and the bright whimsical settings. Altogether a very impressive combination. It’s on my viewing schedule, for sure.

Tags: fall tv, television, tv torrents, fall torrents, pushing daisies

Posted by arieanna on August 30, 2007
1 Comment »

Heroes tonight!

Posted in TV

Yay, it’s finally back! Heroes returns tonight and I am far past excited.

I have been hearing all about this episode for what feels like many many weeks. It’s going to be a good one.

If you want to be spoiled, read here.

Tags: heroes

Posted by arieanna on April 23, 2007
1 Comment »

Interview w/ Chad Faust

Posted in TV

For those of you who like The 4400, I have most of my interview with Chad Faust up over at The4400Guide.

My article (contains spoilers):
http://the4400guide.com/2007/04/09/the-440…to-the-present/

Background questions on Chad Faust:
http://the4400guide.com/2007/04/04/chad-faust-interview/

Discussion about promicin and how it plays out in Season 4 (contains spoilers):
http://the4400guide.com/2007/04/09/the-440…e-promicin-war/

A fan mail story:
http://the4400guide.com/2007/04/04/capable…mass-seduction/

I have probably one more post to put up with more spoilers. Initially, I was going to just put up the article and a transcript of the interview, but the article was delayed after having to confirm whether some spoilers could be leaked or not. Then I decided a 40 minute interview had too many spoilers at once, so I have kept a few really juicy ones back until probably next week. Nonetheless, if you haven’t had any spoilers thus far, the ones I’ve released so far are great.

I have spoilers up to episode 5 of The 4400 Season 4 here. The show will return in June.

Tags: the 4400, the 4400 season 4, chad faust

Posted by arieanna on April 10, 2007
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