Preview: Dexter Season 4 Promo

Thanks to Maureen Ryan's Twitter feed, those not lucky enough to make it San Diego Comic-Con don't have to miss out on the brand new promo for season 4 of Dexter with the first footage of John Lithgow.

Commence goosebumps now.

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Showtime Unceremoniously Cancels Brotherhood

Well, they left us hanging since last December, so I suppose it comes as no big surprise, but Showtime has canceled Brotherhood after only three seasons. The series, in our opinion, was criminally under rated by viewers and critics, rivaling even HBO's The Wire as one of the most under appreciated premium cable shows of all time.

At least The Wire was given a final season by HBO and people started noticing it just in time to finally heap some much deserved praise upon the series before it's death. In canceling Brotherhood, Showtime did little more than offer up a press release six months after the series finale that wasn't even about the show being canceled - it's about the season three DVD release officially being titled Brotherhood: The Final Season.

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New Dexter Season Four Poster

Amazing poster advertising season 4 of Showtime's Dexter appeared around the web today. Apparently some people think it's fake, though I'm not sure why. Seems legit to me. I'm not cool enough to get official press information from Showtime, so I can only guess.

The poster, real or not, is quite brilliant. Obviously the artwork is about Dexter's upcoming fatherhood, which I'm sure will play a big part in the show's fourth season, along with the Trinity Killer.





Season four of Dexter is set to premiere September 27th, which I believe is still a Sunday, the same timeslot the show has occupied since it's pilot. Could you imagine how good the world would be if Sunday nights consisted of HBO's True Blood at 9pm and Showtime's Dexter at 10pm. That's probably too much amazing commercial free goodness to handle, so they keep Sookie in the summer and Dex in the fall. It's for our own safety, I'm sure.

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Second Season For Nurse Jackie

It only debuted last night but Showtime has already given a second season order to it's newest scripted series Nurse Jackie. It sometimes sounds odd when this happens but Showtime is known for confirming second season orders for brand new shows. It's happened with Weeds, United States of Tara, Californication, Tudors and even Huff.

In the case of Huff, it wasn't such a great thing as season two kinda bombed. That was a quality problem, though. The writers and producers kinda went off the deep end with their second and final season using ridiculous plot lines and overly dramatic situations. It was a real change from the subtle quirk and discomfort that made season one so interesting.

Nurse Jackie has been getting pretty good reviews from everyone: bloggers, pro-critics and even the general public if you're a Twitter user. The Showtime PR department has set their twitter account to automatically notify them anytime someone writes a twitter about the show, which is something I figured out when they started following my account less than 5 minutes after posting something about the show so...Hey Showtime PR Department!

The release on this afternoon says of last night's ratings for the premiere "...is better than the premiere ratings for most everything currently on Showtime’s lineup, including “Weeds,” “Dexter,” “The Tudors” and “Californication.”

If you've ever read Showtime press releases for new series, though, you probably realize that you've heard that before. They announce that for pretty much every new show that debuts. That's not to say it isn't true - I'm sure it is. You can't fake the Nielsen's. I'm just get a chuckle out of reading it at the end of every Showtime post-premiere or second season announcement.

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Preview Showtime's Nurse Jackie At Landmark Theaters

Showtime and Landmark Theaters are teaming up for a free preview of Nurse Jackie.  They'll show the first two episodes of the new series and provide free snack and drinks for those lucky enough to live in one of the 10 cities they're doing this.  It's first come first seated and 18 and up only.  Here's the info:

 

Showing are June 3rd, Doors at 7pm, Show at 8pm

 

1. Atlanta - Midtown Art Cinema - 931 Monroe Dr

2. Boston - Kendall Square Cinema - 1 Kendall Sq Bldg 1900

3. Chicago - Century Centre Cinema - 28228 N Clark St Century Shopping Center

4. Dallas - The Magnolia - 3699 McKinney Ave Suite 100

5. Houston - River Oaks Theatre - 2009 West Gray

6. Los Angeles - The Landmark - 10850 West Pico at Westwood Blvd

7. New York - Sunshine Cinema - 143 E Houston St

8. Philadelphia - Ritz at the Bourse - 400 Ranstead St

9. San Francisco - Embarcadero Center Cinema - 1 Embarcadero Center Promenade Level

10. Washington D.C. - E Street Cinema - 555 11th St NW

 

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Breaking My Promise On Nurse Jackie

No Nurse Jackie post as promised through my twitter feed earlier. I was given a link and a code to preview the pilot via Showtime's VIP Insider whatever program and was looking quite forward to viewing the show but it's not to be. Showtime's streaming system is a ridiculous bandwidth hog like you wouldn't believe.

Granted, my cable runs at a relatively low 54.0Mbps, but streaming sites like Hulu and other network pages like ABC.com and CBS.com don't seem to have a problem with that. Showtime seems to disagree for some reason. I made it through 7 minutes and 51 seconds, all of which I'm sure I would have thoroughly enjoyed if it hadn't taken nearly 13 minutes due to all the stop and start buffering.

For a stream that's not commercial supported you would at least think I could hit pause and wait a few minutes for it to load up a bit, but they won't even allow that.

I apologize for not following through and to the Showtime web crew I say "BITE ME."

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Dexter's Fourth Season To Star John Lithgow

One of my top ten shows ever, Showtime's "Dexter", won't be returning for it's fourth season until Sept. 27th but word is out that John Lithgow will be starring as a serial killer who's been at it for nearly three decades called the Trinity Killer. 

 

The official character description: "an unassuming, mild-mannered suburbanite who has been living a dual life as one of America's most prolific and deadliest serial killers."

 

His nickname, the Trinity Killer, comes from the his method of killing in threes.  Lithgow's run, best known to me as the dad from "Harry and The Henderson's" is probably more well known for his lenghy stint on NBC's "30 Rock From The Sun", will last for 12 episodes and Dexter is gonna be rather envious of his ability to ellude suspicion for 30 years.

 

 

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Weeds Season 5 Promos

Weeds will be returning to Showtime on June 8th for it's fifth season. I started watching the show way back when it first started and knew it was a winner right off the bat. The first four seasons really transported Nancy from an iced coffee sipping suburban mom to a full scale drug cartel dealer.

My one complaint about Weeds is that they don't change things up fast enough. The difference between a really good show and an amazing show is the ability of it's producers and writers to know when to change things up before the show gets stale. Unfortunately for Weeds, I tend to ween in and out of love with the show because they just don't time the changes right - they wait until the show gets stale to change it up.

Two things the show does have going for it are the writers great humor and Mary-Louis Parker. These may not be as great as last seasons nude MLP promos, but here you go:









Other season 5 goodies include a countdown widget and some really weird videos posted to Facebook.

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Sho Denies L Word Spin Off

Showtime shot down four pilots this month. That's a bit surprising considering some of the names included. I imagine things can get a bit awkward when you turn down a new show by the creator of one of your most popular shows that's still on the air, such as Weed's creator Jenji Kohan, who's comedy Ronna and Beverly was passed on (though if the name is any indication...). The meeting at which they turned down a spin off of The L Word, featuring Leisha Haley, was probably a little uncomfortable, too.

Showtime has never (to my knowledge) worked on an original series with Tim Robins or Matthew Perry, but they were both turned away, too. Robbins' show, Possible Side Effects, had Josh Lucas starring and Perry was producing and starring in The End of Steve. All four shows featured big names on both sides of camera, which is what's so surprising.

I'm hoping one or two of these pop up on other networks. Pilots being resurrected elsewhere is not outside the realm of reality. Fox famously passed on The Sopranos only to have it picked up by HBO. We all now realize The Sopranos would not have been half as great had it been on a broadcast network, so sometimes the original network may not be the right one.

It also makes me wonder just what will they be airing? If a network isn't picking anything they're bound to run out of original programming sooner or later. I don't know about anyone else, but I only subscribe to Showtime for the original series. With the news last week that The Tudors has just been renewed for a fourth and final season, The L Word having just concluded it's run, ITV has yet to announce a third season of Secret Diary of A Call Girl and there's also been no word of a fourth season of This American Life, I'm a little worried about that.


Check them out at iTunes: The L Word, Weeds, This American Life, The Sopranos, The Tudors.




     
 

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