Sci-Fi Storm

James Middleton, who serves as a consulting producer on the upcoming Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles series on Fox as well as associate producer for the Terminator 4 movie, says that the two will diverge in separate timelines. The series will continue after the events of the second movie, and ignore what happened in the third movie. In the meantime, the fourth movie, which will not star Arnold Schwarzenegger – nor will he appear in any sequels (it is expected to form a new trilogy). It will pick up where Terminator 3: The Rise of the Machines left off – after a nuclear exchange, dealing with the post-apocalyptic world.

For those who have been following the High Definition DVD Format Wars, the end could possibly be nigh. Warner Bros. Entertainment, who was the only studio that had been releasing on both the Blu-Ray and HD-DVD formats, has chosen to back Blu-Ray only. HD-DVD releases will continue through May 2008, but they will not release some time after the DVD and Blu-Ray releases. This leaves only Paramount/Dreamworks (Viacom) and Universal in the HD-DVD camp – and Universal, unlike Paramount/Dreamworks, does not have an exclusive deal with HD-DVD. Boy, I’m feeling better about Santa bringing me a Playstation 3…Update 1/9: This may allow Paramount to use an escape clause…

TheThunderChild writes “There are over 35 science fiction and fantasy conventions being held in the US during 2008, and quite a few in other areas of North America and the world as well. The Thunder Child has updated its 2008 science fiction calendar. Conventions are sorted into three categories – North America by date, North America by location, and The World. http://thethunderchild.com/Conventions/USCalendarB yDate.html is the URL to get you started. By the way, we need Convention Correspondents, so give us a shout if you attend a convention and would like to write it up for us.”

For those of you who absolutely must have everything related to Battlestar Galactica – regardless of the quality – the DVD set for Galactica 1980 was released several days early today. Quite often panned and derided as one of the worst shows ever, it does have one redeeming quality – an episode called “The Return of Starbuck”, featuring Dirk Benedict and featuring a story that was more like the original show. Otherwise, it quickly devolves into a “superkids on Earth” show.

Stargate – The Ark of Truth, the first of two new direct-to-DVD movies for the crew of SG-1, comes out on March 11th. SG-1 heads into the Ori galaxy looking for a weapon to use against them.

I just learned this morning that the entire production team that runs the STARTREK.COM web site has been eliminated during a restructuring of CBS Interactive. No word on what will happen to the site itself – I fear it will simply turn in to a corporate advertisement for the franchise and lose all of its value as a tool.

I sat on this news for a while as I know he wanted to keep it relatively quiet (as if my readership is more than just a blip), but its out in the wild now. Author Terry Pratchett, best known for his Discworld series of books, announced on Tuesday that he has been diagnosed with a rare form of early
onset Alzheimer’s Disease. He does state, “I am not dead,” and does not want people to treat him as such. He expects to meet all current obligations and hopefully all future obligations as well.

Book 12 of the late Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series, A Memory of Light, will be finished. Tor Books has announced the selection of Brandon Sanderson (Mistborn) by Jordan’s wife and editor, Harriet Popham Rigney, to complete the book. Jordan left plenty of notes and audio recordings with which to build the remainder of the novel.

I’m sending this from an airport on my way back home. I should be able to catch up on the news in the next couple of days after I recover… 🙂 Save me some time by submitting any interesting news stories…

TheThunderChild writes “The Commodore (aka Michael Sinclair) was a supporting member to Nippon 2007, and he shared the 150 page program book with The Thunder Child. http://thethunderchild.com/Conventions/Nippon2007/ .
Michael also shared with us his experiences with the Say Da To Moscow campaign of 1989, when he and his wife masterminded the attempt to get the WorldCon for Moscow. http://thethunderchild.com/Conventions/SayDaToMoscow.
And finally, Michael shared a few horror stories of hotels he’d stayed at during his fan-going days. http://thethunderchild.com/Conventions/CommodoresR amblings/HotelHorrors.html.”