February 18th was the release date for the first box set of the 2002 He-Man and the Master of the Universe animated series. Just before that, however, some news started coming in about a defect on the first disc of the set.

BCI Guy a member of the He-Man.org forums and representative of BCI itself (the company producing the sets) had this to say:

“Sorry for the delay getting back to everyone, but I needed to make sure we were totally sure what happened, how we could fix it, and what we could do about it before reporting anything.

The masters that we received from Mattel are complete – the scene is not missing. The problem was in authoring. There is a layer break in the episode (Disc 1, Episode 4) and when the layer switches, it skips over about 3 minutes of the program. Unfortunately, it’s during a transition and there is no visible or audible break, so the only way to notice it’s there is through story continuity. And no one that watched the check discs caught that it was missing. Honestly, that’s not a valid excuse – it should’ve been caught by someone, and the authoring house needed to realize that one episode was running 3 minutes short. It’s inexcusable, and we’re taking drastic measures to fix this problem once and for all. We’re committed to giving everyone the best possible product – content, features, packaging and quality control. 3 out of those 4 is not nearly enough, so we’re moving Volumes 2 and 3 to a new authoring house that has assured us of the quality and depth of their Quality Control department.

We have already reauthored Disc 1 and will have replacements available by street date – Feb 19th. We will be setting up an 800# to request replacement discs which we will ship out along with a new exclusive bonus item for your trouble and as an apology from us.

We appreciate your continued support.”

This was posted here.

As a follow up a few days later, this was posted on He-Man.org, once again from BCI Guy:

“The replacement disc for Mattel’s He Man Volume 1, Disc One can be ordered by either sending an email to HeManDisc@gmail.com or calling 866-641-3472. Please include your name, your address, a daytime telephone number and the store name and location where you purchased your DVD.”

Its been a hard couple months, but the writers will go back to work on Wednesday. Its hard to say what shows from this season can be saved and what will just have to wait to come back in fall, but late night talk shows can finally breath a sigh of relief and all the movies that have been held from production since November can finally get the scripts done and go into shootings.
Transformers 2 should go into production in June as planned, LOST should get some more new episodes before the end of the year, and GIJOE will hopefully get a drastic re-write to not suck. Mercifully, Justice League remains cancelled.

Writers’ union backs deal to end Hollywood strike

UPDATE: Video Embedded.

Cyber Group Animation, the animation company doing the new Wolverine and the X-Men cartoon, has posted this trailer on their website.

A lot can be seen about the story and the animation of this show from this short trailer. Wolverine, is charged with rounded up a fractured team of X-Men in Professor Xavier’s absence.

The character designs are close to those seen in X-Men Evolution, and this new show shares both a director and writer with it as well. It’s not totally clear whether or not this series is intended to remain canon with X-Men Evolution though we’re seeing many of the same characters appearing.

For more on this show check out the official site or it’s imdb page.

BCI has created an exclusive slipcase for the Mike Young Productions’ Masters of the Universe DVDs. The slipcase will come with the first volume as a Best Buy exclusive and be able to hold all three forthcoming volumes. The spine of the slipcase will continue the mural created across the spines of the classic He-Man, New Adventures of He-man and She-Ra Princess of Power DVD sets. Thus, of course, causing my OCD to kick in and make me finish off my Princess Of Power DVDs so there are no gaps in my DVD spine mural.

 

Remember the first volume is set to be released on February 19th. You can see details here.

You can pre-order it here if you don’t care about the exclusive slipcase. If you do care about the slipcase, then you will only be able to find that at Best Buy.

Source: He-man.org

Oceanic Airlines Flight 815 was lost somewhere over the South Pacific on September 22, 2004.

Or at least thats the premise behind the the TV show LOST. And now the show that so dearly loves teasing its fans and with viral sites and meta games has branched out into billboards for the fictional airline that led most of the cast to a mysterious island where they’ve been trapped for 67 days thus far.

The billboards point to a web site: FlyOceanicAir.com, which heralds the return of the airline to the air. Theres even a press release. Of course watching the little video is interrupted by a man wanting to know what really happened, and links to another site: Find815.

LOST will return with at least 8 new episodes on January 31st in the US on ABC.

From /Film and TV Squad

Scott Peters, creator and executive producer of the 4400, has posted a note on the official 4400 message board that the 4400 has been canceled.

This will be a great disappointment to fans of the show who were left with yet another cliffhanger at the end of season 4 as a number of questions about the story remained unanswered.

No doubt a barrage of online petitions will follow this announcement. Feel free to write angry letters if you think that might make you feel better.

The first 3 seasons are already available on DVD:

TVSquad was on hand for the unveiling of new KITT car from the upcoming Knight Rider series airing on February 17 on NBC. The series will focus on the estranged son of Michael Knight (the main character from the original series played by the ‘Hoff.)

KITT is a Ford Mustang Shelby GT500KR. Three cars were shown; a remote operated car, a street car and a stunt car.

Check out the link for more pictures of the cars and the cast and additional information on the show.

Source: TVSquad

Paul Fusco has come out of exile to perform once again as ALF. Apparently after one season of his TVLand show (the cancelled “ALF’s hit talk show) he’s now interested in being a Fox News Pundit.
Though his show has been off the air for quite some time, I’m happy to see all 4 seasons are on DVD.
For those that might’ve forgotten this classic, the canned laughter sitcom highlight reel is included below. [Read the rest of this entry…]