News from Westeros and Deadwood from HBO, 90210 reunion event news, Star Trek plots a new course on Nickelodeon, and more of the biggest TV news from this week.
While HBO is well into production on one of the Game of Thrones prequel scripts it commissioned last year, one of the potential spin-off series is dead. Game of Thrones writer and co-executive producer Bryan Cogman, who has written 11 episodes of the series (including Sunday’s “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms”), confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter that his spin-off is no longer in the works.
“I was developing one of the successor shows with George [R.R. Martin]. George has worked with a bunch of the writers, including Jane [Goldman], whose show is being done [as a pilot]. My prequel show is not happening and will not happen. HBO decided to go a different way,” he told the publication
“It is a goodbye. I am done with Westeros,” he added. “It’s wonderfully bittersweet. I’ll certainly miss it, but I’m excited to go out on my own and try to be in the captain’s chair of my own projects, armed with everything I’ve learned. I’ve learned more than I could possibly imagine from eight seasons of this thing. It’s been wonderful to look back and watch some of the old episodes, and see some of our old friends at the premiere recently, and to know that we’ve done something good. We’ve done good work that people enjoy. That’s all an entertainer can ever hope for. I’m eager to start the next chapter, but a part of my heart will always live with Game of Thrones.”
(Photo by Earl Gibson III/Getty Images)
Former Beverly Hills, 90210 good girl-gone-bad Brenda Walsh will appear in Fox’s six-episode event series BH90210, the network announced on Friday. Shannen Doherty, who played Brenda in the teen drama, joins her former co-stars – Jason Priestley, Jennie Garth, Ian Ziering, Gabrielle Carteris, Brian Austin Green and Tori Spelling – in the irreverent new series airing this summer.
“This time when the cast gets back together, it will come with a big twist: the seven former teen idols will be playing heightened versions of themselves,” Fox said in an announcement.
The series description promises drama inspired by the actors’ own real lives and relationships with each other:
“Having gone their separate ways since the original series ended 19 years ago, Shannen, Jason, Jennie, Ian, Gabrielle, Brian and Tori reunite when one of them suggests it’s time to get a Beverly Hills, 90210 reboot up and running. But getting it going may make for an even more delicious soap than the reboot itself. What will happen when first loves, old romances, friends, and frenemies come back together, as this iconic cast – whom the whole world watched grow up together – attempts to continue from where they left off?”
BH90210 will be produced by CBS Television Studios and Fox Entertainment.
Doherty will executive-produce alongside Chris Alberghini, Mike Chessler, Patrick Sean Smith, Gabrielle Carteris, Jennie Garth, Brian Austin Green, Jason Priestley, Tori Spelling and Ian Ziering. The series was conceived by Alberghini, Chessler, Spelling and Garth.
HBO has finally released the first trailer for its long- (long-, long-, long-) anticipated Deadwood continuation, titled Deadwood: The Movie. The feature-length film, which debuts May 31, will star the series’ entire original cast (Timothy Olyphant, Ian McShane, and more) and picks up 10 years after the series finale. It also includes the series’ trademark penchant for blue language, but you’ll have to wait approximately 40 seconds for the first c—sucker to drop. Deadwood ran for three seasons from 2004-2006, and the stars and creator David Milch have spent the intervening 13 years fielding questions from reporters and fans about a follow-up. In just one month (and change), that follow-up film will finally be here.
Other new trailers this week include:
(Photo by Ben Mark Holzberg/CBS)
The Star Trek universe is getting even bigger: Nickelodeon announced that it is developing an original CG-animated Star Trek series for the network. The series focuses on “a group of lawless teens who discover a derelict Starfleet ship and use it to search for adventure, meaning, and salvation,” and comes from Kevin and Dan Hageman (Trollhunters, Ninjago).
The animated series joins current Star Trek projects that include CBS All Access’ Star Trek: Discovery, short-form series Star Trek: Short Treks, an untitled series featuring Patrick Stewart reprising his role as Jean-Luc Picard, a potential spin-off starring Michelle Yeoh and based on top-secret Star Trek intelligence agency Section 31, and an animated comedy series targeted at mature audiences called Star Trek: Lower Decks.
Tired of sitting in front of the TV only to scroll through Netflix’s seemingly endless options until you decide to just go to bed instead of watching anything at all? Netflix wants to help. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the company is testing out a new “shuffle” feature that would play a random episode of television (like, say, an episode of The Office or Friends) for the indecisive.
“We are testing the ability for members to play a random episode from different TV series on the Android mobile app,” a Netflix spokeswoman told THR in a statement. “These tests typically vary in length of time and by region, and may not become permanent.”
Former Game of Thrones star Harry Lloyd, who just wrapped two seasons on Starz’ stellar spy drama Counterpart, will star alongside Alden Ehrenreich in USA Network’s adaptation of Aldous Huxley’s classic novel Brave New World. Lloyd Will play Bernard Marx, a citizen of utopian society New London, who vacations outside the safe New World to the Savage Lands and barely escape a violent rebellion. Upon return, life is not the same.
Joss Whedon’s newest leading lady will be familiar to Outlander fans. Laura Donnelly, who played Jenny Fraser on the Starz drama, will play the lead in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator’s newest TV project, HBO’s The Nevers. According to Deadline, she’ll play Amelia True, a reckless, impulsive, and emotionally damaged hero and menace to stuffy Victorian society. The sci-fi series follows a gang of Victorian women with unusual abilities and a world-changing mission, and was written by Whedon, Jane Espenson, and Doug Petrie, and will be directed by Whedon, who will also serve as showrunner.
Rosemarie DeWitt will star alongside Reese Witherspoon and Kerry Washington in Hulu’s upcoming adaptation of the bestseller Little Fires Everywhere. She’ll play Linda, the BFF of Witherspoon’s character, who takes in an infant who was abandoned at a local fire station. But when the baby’s birth mother, a Chinese immigrant who’s in the country illegally, returns, Linda begins to stress over the possibility of losing her daughter.
Shazam! star Zachary Levi will host the 2019 MTV Movie & TV Awards, which will air Monday, June 17 at 9 p.m. on MTV. And finally, The Masked Singer winner T-Pain has a new gig on Fox: Performing at the 2019 Miss USA competition on May 2, which will air live from Reno and will be hosted by Vanessa and Nick Lachey.
