2008 Comic-Con

I'm finally recovered(ish) from my busy weekend in San Diego for Comic-Con! A ton of the festival's action took place on Friday and Saturday, so just in case you missed it, here's a handy-dandy guide to all of my write-ups:

Movie-Related Posts
Comic-Con Surprise — Hugh Jackman Shows Up With Wolverine Footage!
Lucy Lawless Tells Kevin Smith What's What at Comic-Con
The Spirit Looks Good, Watchmen Looks Freaking Awesome
EW's Filmmakers Panel With Smith, Apatow, Snyder, and Miller

TV-Related Posts
True Blood Sucks In the Enthusiasm at Comic-Con
First Look: Dexter's Third Season
First Episode of Heroes Season Three Screened at Comic-Con
Lost Producers Say Seasons Five and Six Will Be Rewarding
Pushing Daisies Delightfully Teases Season Two at Comic-Con
Cows — and Roberto Orci — Promote Fringe in San Diego
First Look: Chuck Season Two
Kristin Chenoweth Sings "Somewhere Over the Rainbow"
A Chat With Spaced's Simon Pegg, Edgar Wright, and Jessica Hynes
EW's Television Visionaries Talk Sci-Fi and Pies

Assorted Goodies
BuzzSugar at Comic-Con: Day One!
Comic-Con Round-Up

As I mentioned in my writeup of the Pushing Daisies panel at Comic-Con, one of the greatest moments was getting to hear an impromptu song from Kristin Chenoweth upon the request of one very cute, very young fan.

I was able to pull the song off my recorder, and so now, you can check Chenoweth's gorgeous rendition of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" for yourself. The audio isn't perfect — I wasn't expecting to be recording a Tony winner (and Emmy nominee and onetime Miss Oklahoma runner-up!) when I woke up on Saturday — but even with some fuzz, you'll get the idea.

The recording starts with the fan's request — then you'll hear some applause (which was even louder in the room!) and then the start of the song. To check it out, just read more

Hands down, one of the highlights of my Comic-Con experience was getting to meet Simon Pegg and his Spaced cohorts, despite the brevity of our interaction. I sat down for a quick roundtable interview with Pegg and his costar on Spaced, Jessica Hynes, along with Edgar Wright, Pegg's frequent partner in crime (Hot Fuzz, Shaun of the Dead) and the director of Spaced.

In the British comedy, Pegg and Hynes play Tim and Daisy, who rent a flat in London under the pretense that they are a couple. The show is filled with pop culture references and surreal experiences, and if you haven't already, you ought to get ahold of the newly available Spaced DVDs. For now, check out some of the highlights from our chat.

Q: There are a lot of horror references in Spaced. How did that come about?

Edgar Wright: I think that really is my default setting of shooting everything like it was a horror film, for no apparent reason. I mean, there were definitely a lot of references in the script already, particularly to The Shining . . . The whole style of the show is very stylized and sort of kinetic because the characters are so drenched in pop culture, it’s almost like, if they ever had to describe their mundane lives, this [a horror movie] is what it would look like. So it’s almost like, you’re watching them recount their lives, rather than the actuality.

Simon Pegg: Yeah, 'cause they’re like, "I went to work in a kitchen and it was like One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest." Or, "I walked into the room that time and it was like the f---ing Evil Dead," you know? And that’s what you actually see. All three of us love the idea of taking very mundane things and turning them into slightly more grand, cinematic things. Which we took forward into Shaun of the Dead as well after having learned that on Spaced. Jess and I certainly wanted to have this world that was defined by popular culture, shaped by it.

The trio expounds on this and other things (like their intense admiration of Arrested Development), so read more

Yesterday, I told you about the rowdy panel of filmmaking greats I attended at Comic-Con. Today, I've got some notes from the television "Visionaries" event, which brought together showrunners Josh Schwartz (Chuck and Gossip Girl), Josh Friedman (Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles), Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse (Lost), and Bryan Fuller (Pushing Daisies). Here are just a few of the highlights:

• A running joke throughout the panel was teasing Josh Schwartz about Gossip Girl in any way possible. At one point, when the show came up in a question, he said he thought that mentioning it was "a little verboten at Comic-Con," which led the — considerable! — GG fans in the audience to make their presence known. Later, in response to a question about so-called "genre" shows getting lots of buzz over the past few years, Schwartz quipped: "Serena is now a cyborg."
• On a related note, plenty of people (rightly) saw the Q&A portion of this panel as their best chance to ask questions of the Lost producers before the mad crush of the Lost-specific event the next day, prompting one panelist (I unfortunately couldn't see which one, as I was on the other side of the huge line) to point at the questioners and count them down, saying, "Lost, Lost, Lost, Piemaker, Piemaker, Lost . . . [mooney voice] Gossip Girl!"
• Bryan Fuller is just a big bundle of cotton candy and flowers and goodness. Some various quotes summing up the sweetness: "I am a very sensitive soul. I couldn't do a series like CSI or Criminal Minds where you have to be in a negative headspace all the time. I just wanted to cram a show with as many things that make me smile as possible, like puppies and pie." And, later, "I think we need more awe."
• Also, why is the piemaker not, say, a cake baker? "Cake is dry," Fuller said.

To find out which of these guys likes Project Runway, just read more

Entertainment Weekly held a few "Visionaries" panels at Comic-Con that brought together some of the greats in the TV, movies and comic book worlds. At the filmmakers panel, it was mostly a kick to see Kevin Smith, Judd Apatow, Zack Snyder and Frank Miller all at one table. It turned into the Smith-Apatow comedy hour, but that seemed to suit the audience members (myself included) just fine. Check out some of the highlights below.

• The whole panel was super bawdy and raunchy, mostly due to Smith and Apatow making dirty jokes about each other. And then there was the smiling, friendly-faced Zack Snyder, who awkwardly bumbled out an answer to a question, after which there were about three beats of silence before Smith said, "Thank God your visuals are so strong, man." Smith later marveled at how awesome Snyder's Watchmen looks, saying he could die once he sees that movie.
• Apatow talked about his raunchy comedies: "You have to find out: how much penis can you show in a movie without clearing an entire room?" Meanwhile, Smith nodded, deadpan, like he totally understood.
• Smith: "I go with my gut, but my gut has lied to me in the past, like, when my gut said, 'Yeah, Jersey Girl's a great idea!'"
• Frank Miller: "Very early on I learned I was incompetent at anything else. So I started to make comic books."

More on comics, geek culture, and how comedians differ from rappers (according to Apatow), if you read more

It's one thing to hear all about the twists and turns coming up on the second season of Chuck. But it's another thing entirely to get to see them — and that's exactly what happened over the weekend when Josh Schwartz, Zachary Levi, and the rest took the stage at Comic-Con. While there's no official version of the almost 7-minute trailer, E!'s Kristin Dos Santos, who moderated the panel, got her spies out to capture the video from the big screen. (So what I'm saying is: Agent Casey, blame her, not me!)

Among the wonderful things to be glimpsed in the trailer: a shot of the Nicole Richie shower fight, Tony Hale dressing down the Buy More crew, more than one Chuck/Sarah kiss, and the first appearance of Jill! I'm so psyched, so to see if the season looks like you were hoping, just read more

A herd of cattle grazing in a parking lot probably isn't the weirdest thing I saw during Comic-Con, but it's not too far off. The dozen or so cows had a purpose, though, serving as a clue along the way during a Fringe-related scavenger hunt in San Diego.

If you've seen the Fringe pilot — which several thousand more people now have seen following the San Diego screenings — you'll get the cow thing, which also came up at TCA; if not, stay tuned for Fall. But cute (though smelly) as they were, the cows weren't the best thing I found in the parking lot. Nope, that would be Roberto Orci, Fringe (and Star Trek) writer and executive producer, who chatted with me briefly about what Comic-Con has meant for Fringe. The entire show actually has its roots in the convention, so to hear about that, just read more

Wow could this line up of Comic-Con attendees be any more fun? Talk about a manjoyment fest, yummy. Joshua Jackson missed the TCAs, but made it out to promote Fringe at the convention while J.J. Abrams also rewarded fans of his other show Lost with some of the stars, upcoming show tidbits, and Dharma Initiative-approved gifts. Even better, the lucky audience at the Heroes panel were treated not only to cast members including Milo and Hayden, but the first episode of the new season — check out what lucky Buzz had to say about that! Thankfully it looks like Justin Long was in better spirits while James Franco was cute as always. Buzz is down in San Diego for all the fun so don't miss any of her coverage here!

To see lots more from the weekend including Ali Larter, David Boreanaz, Common, Kristin Chenoweth, Benicio Del Toro, Eliza Dushku, Masi Oka, Zachary Quinto, Jaime King, Samuel L Jackson, and lots of others just read more

I've been reporting from Comic-Con these past few days, but here's a hodgepodge of random extra bits and pieces from my weekend.

• There was a panel I basically happened to attend by accident, which ended up being for this spooky-looking movie The Wolf Man, due in theaters April 3, 2009. Then, to everyone's surprise, the stars of the film, Benicio Del Toro and Emily Blunt, came onstage to talk about it. I'll post the trailer soon, so more on the movie itself later, but for now, how cute is this picture?!
• The writers of The Office spoke to a packed house on Saturday, and while the 11 people on the panel (12 if you count moderator Rainn Wilson) felt like a few too many, there were plenty of funny moments, especially from BJ Novak, Michael Schur, and Mindy Kaling. I particularly liked this part of Novak's answer about why he likes writing for Michael Scott: "It's so interesting to see someone with authority be so innocent and so wrong."
• Also a winner from that panel: Schur's description of how Dwight would act in the event of an actual robot invasion. "He would cross his arms in the middle of the street as the robots marched down the street, shaking his head and saying 'I told you so!'"
• Yeah, the Heroes screening and Hugh Jackman appearance were cool — but one of my other favorite panels of the weekend was much, much smaller. On Friday, I got to hear some of the original voice actors from the classic Peanuts specials talk about what it was like to put together shows like A Charlie Brown Christmas and Bon Voyage, Charlie Brown. Several of the specials will be out on remastered, special-feature-laden DVDs this Fall, and I can't wait! Eventually, they're hoping to bring all the specials (more than 40 of them!) to DVD.
• Also, some of the best trivia of the whole weekend came out of that panel: Did you know Fergie was once the voice of Charlie Brown's little sister, Sally? (For more Peanuts trivia, check out today's Brainteaser!)

To find out Seth Rogen's latest dirty comment and to see Zachary Levi's hand in a compromising position, read more