TV Spoilers & Speculation Corner: 06/06/12

Syfy has picked up Lost Girl‘s 22-episode third season, to be aired starting in January (presumably in tandem with season three of Being Human). Season two will continue to run all summer.

This week, we have spoilers for Once Upon a Time and Supernatural:

Once Upon a Time (Sunday nights, 8pm, ABC)
By Heather S. Vina

The show was one of the ones featured in last week’s TV Guide Magazine “Finale” issue (June 4-10). I don’t see a scan of it online, and the site doesn’t feature it, so here are some quotes from my issue:

The question the magazine asks is: “What the heck was that purple smoke?”

A: “The purple smoke is magic. They’re bringing magic to reality, but does that mean Fairytale Land exists again? That we can go back and forth?” says Jennifer Morrison (Emma). Explains the article, all the producers have told her is that “something exciting is going on.”

Also according to Jennifer, the characters will not be returning to their fairy-tale lives and that will be explained in season two: “Breaking the curse may just be the beginning of the final battle.”

Matt at TV Guide discussed his “Emmy” predictions and whether or not Robert Carlyle should/will get a nom for “Best Supporting Actor”. Of anyone on the show, he would be my choice, as he does an excellent job of playing the same character with different personalities.

TV Guide also listed the show as a “winner” in their online “Biggest Winners/Losers” article.

Spoiler TV has up a video interview with Raphael Sbarge (Jiminy Cricket/Archie). You can see it at their site, here.

Ausiello at TVLine had a bit up on the show in his latest column from producer/writer Jane Espenson:

“Question: TVLine’s comments section re: Once Upon a Time is the best. Anything you can share to spark more prediction threads about next season? – Jen
“Ausiello: Don’t count on a time jump between seasons. ‘We’re picking up right where we left off, but where we left off was in the middle of a veer in a different direction,’ consulting producer Jane Espenson told TVLine’s Meg Masters at last weekend’s ATX Television Festival in Austin, before reiterating, ‘Season 2 will be different than Season 1.’”

“Question: Any word on which new fairy tale characters Once Upon a Time will introduce in Season 2?  – Claire
“Ausiello: The frontrunner would seem to be the Little Mermaid. ‘I would hope Ariel would join the show,’ says Espenson. ‘She’s one we’ve definitely talked about.’ But there have certainly been others. ‘There are a whole lot of princesses we haven’t seen – like Aurora, Rapunzel and Jasmine,’ she adds. ‘And it’s hard to look at that list without going, Well, what about Goldilocks?! And they’d all be good, because what we do is take them and go, Well, the thing you never knew about Little Miss Muffet is….‘”

Also at TVLine, the site has up an interview with Lana Parilla (Regina, the Evil Queen), who discusses what the advent of magic into Storybrooke could mean for Regina.

That’s it for this week! Hopefully, we will get more soon and, hopefully, they will announce who is attending Comic-Con this year for the show. Last year, it was every lead actor except for Jared Gilmore (Henry). As they showed the entire pilot, there wasn’t much from the panel, but, hopefully this year, there will be more interaction with the writers, producers and cast.

Supernatural (Friday nights, 9pm, CW)
By Paula R. Stiles

The Canadian version of the online TV Guide site started a potential firestorm last week by stating that Sera Gamble was fired and didn’t quit. Curiously, a gossip site also claimed around the time of the announcement she was leaving (back in early April) that she had been fired, even quoting an unnamed source: “Supernatural has a strong fan base, but people just didn’t like what Sera has done…If [the fans] weren’t so dedicated, the show would have been cancelled during her first season.” However, the TV Guide site does not cite anyone (so it could have been just an assumption by the article’s author). Plus, the “unnamed source” game is an easy way to make up quotes. So, it’s really not been confirmed one way or the other and likely won’t be any time soon. I’m not sure it matters at this point. Whether she chose to pursue other projects or they just didn’t renew her contract, the result is the same and she’s gone as a showrunner. She has already confirmed that she won’t be writing for the show, anymore, either. Overall, fans seem relieved, so it’s probably just as well.

Speaking of rumours about writers leaving, another kerfuffle occurred earlier in the week when an article reported that Ben Edlund and Ben Blacker were leaving. This seemed a little odd. What about Ben Acker? And hadn’t Blacker and Acker already said they were leaving last season? Both Acker and Blacker then confirmed that they were, indeed, leaving, but that Edlund was staying. It’s nice to hear some confirmation that Edlund is sticking around, but it’s not as though they would tell anyone before an official announcement of Edlund were leaving. For now, anyway, Edlund’s still with the show.

In all honesty, I’m a little sad they won’t be back. I liked “The Mentalists”. Even if the rumours that Edlund rewrote the episode heavily are true, it was still different from his other work. If we have to lose a writing team, I’d as soon it be Dabb and Loflin, who seem to have run out of gas. Ah, well. Hopefully, they will revive under the new showrunner.

A late interview from the upfronts with Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles came out last week. No spoilers, but Padalecki admitted what the worst song on his iPod is.

The Paris con finally ran last weekend, with guests Richard Speight Jr., Mark Sheppard, Sebastian Roche, Chad Lindberg, and Jason Manns. No spoilers appear to have come out of this con.

This Friday’s repeat will be “Hello Cruel World”.

Finally, the ratings for the repeat of “Out with the Old” were 0.3/1 in the demo and 740,000 in the audience, which put it in the upper third of the pack and near the top of the repeats.

So, not a lot of spoilers this week. It’s June and things are usually pretty slow before Comic-Con. So, let’s look at six reasons why our new showrunner, Jeremy Carver, might be good for Supernatural:

1. He likes canon. He’s demonstrated this in Being Human. By that, I mean he’s recognised that the first rule of telling a coherent long-term story that people will stick with and care about is staying true to the storyline you’ve got. This showed up in things like Bishop’s rebellion near the end of season one and Sally’s Reaper plot this season. Just when you were thinking, “Wow, the writers are really screwing with their own canon,” it turns out that things were not what they seemed. In other words, while apparent canon carnage has signaled, “I don’t give a damn,” in the past for Supernatural showrunners, on the Syfy version of Being Human, it usually signals a sleight of hand for a huge twist that will bring everything back into alignment for one big “AH-HA!” Also, he’s remembered Supernatural canon (like Dean not remembering Tessa near the beginning of “Death Takes a Holiday”, or that iron can trap ghosts) when other writers haven’t.

2. He paces well. He paces very, very well. While the middle can meander a little bit in seasons for Being Human, everything builds up to a point where you do not want to miss the last third of the season. This is because revelations are carefully spread out over episodes between 10 and 13, such that it’s an extended season finale, as opposed to the Supernatural tendency to cram anything big into the last episode, or maybe two. Nothing is wasted in Being Human. If anything, some middle storylines (like the Pureblood twins in season two) have seemed rushed for lack of time on Being Human, indicating that Carver might actually benefit more from having ten extra episodes, not flounder around, wondering how to fill them. My impression from his various episodes of Supernatural and his pacing on Being Human is that the one thing Carver doesn’t lack is ideas about what to do with a season’s worth of episodes.

3. He shares well. All three of the main characters in Being Human got equal time and I was pretty happy with the development for all three of them (and even a side character or two) by the end of season two. Characters in his Supernatural episodes also get equal time. He has created some fan favourites, like Grandpa Shady (before he was shady), Grandma Deanna, Young Mary, Young John, Casey, Raphael, Jody Mills, and the evil pagan Christmas gods. Plus, he wrote a Bobby-centric episode and an entire episode about the backstory for Castiel’s vessel. He’s not a fanboy of just one character. This show needs that.

4. He likes Dean. He likes Dean a whole lot. This is the guy who had Dean kill a high-level angel and stand toe to toe with its death grace. This is a guy who wasn’t afraid to separate the brothers or send Dean back in time alone to have 95% of an episode to himself. This is a guy who had Dean go off on an episode-long adventure with Castiel. He likes Dean. And he seems to love giving Jensen Ackles different things to do, whether it’s flipping out and telling Team Free Will to take a hike, or hobnobbing with a demon while trapped in a cellar, or getting killed in a hundred different ways. Carver’s version of Dean is also really quite feral. Which is hardly a shocker when you consider Aidan on Being Human.

5. I like his version of Sam. His version of Sam is smart and brave, has a learning curve and a sense of humour, loves his brother, and doesn’t have his head stuck somewhere unmentionable. His Sam has growth. His Sam is a hero. I’d like to get to know that Sam better.

6. He plays well with others. Lest we forget the other person who makes Being Human great, Carver has been co-running that show with his wife for two seasons. He knows how to be a team player. And his cast loves him. We need a Supernatural showrunner in the writers’ room who is also beloved by his/her cast.

We’ll be back next week with more spoilers. Stay tuned and check out our reviews of Game of Thrones, Doctor Who, Torchwood, The Event, Once Upon a Time, Grimm, and Supernatural.