New Iron Man Trailer To Air During NEXT Week's Lost

[UPDATE: Click here for the new full Iron Man movie trailer!]

It seems there was confusion yesterday that no doubt caused a spike in ratings for ABC's Lost.

Marvel.com put out a story stating that a brand new Iron Man trailer would premiere during last night's episode. SuperHeroHype picked it up (they've since removed the post), and then scads of other websites picked it up an posted it as well. Considering that the source was Marvel itself, that's understandable.

However the whole thing turned out to be off by one week.

Lost Season 4 Premiere Satisfies And Annoys

Lost has finally returned, and this episode was an odd mix of satisfaction and, at the end, frustration.

It satisfied because there was actually some sense of forward movement in the story. It felt like something was actually happening. The "rescuers" will soon be coming, there are actual conversations with someone on the freighter via the uber-satellite phone, the castaways learn that Charlie has died and that the rescuers may actually have some nefarious purpose related to the island.

Lost Season 4 Preview Plus: 3 Seasons In 8 Minutes!

All right... now THIS is the way to watch ABC's Lost.

Over at the official website for the show they're running an eight minute clip before the trailer for the Lost season 4 premiere that summarizes all the major plot points of the last three years.

While the trailer for season 4 does look interesting and cool, I am not looking forward to the teaspoon-sized portions of plot development every episode that we are no doubt going to be getting. If the show was going to conclude in season 4 I'd be really excited about it, but the prospect of this being dragged out for another three years is really annoying.

The Flip Side Of The Writers' Strike

My personal opinions have me on the side of the writers in regards to the current WGA writers' strike situation. The studios have got to be kidding when they cry "we can't afford it" when it comes to compensating the folks that are the foundation of the TV and movie entertainment business. Yes, the bulk of the issue is "new" digital media includes the streaming of TV shows on the web where perhaps it's so new that the studios don't have the economics of the whole thing worked out, but writers should get residuals from this as they do from any other media as far as I'm concerned.

There is no doubt that the current WGA writers' strike is going to have a big impact on the 2007/2008 televsion season, maybe even bigger than was originally anticipated. Many popular TV series and talk shows have already stopped production, and there are rumors that some series that are supposed to start in January like Lost and 24 may end up getting their premiere dates pushed way back due to this whole thing. 24 may not begin until the strike is over and Lost may end up getting pushed back to 2009.

As has been mentioned here, this also affects movie production since most movies have ongoing script tweaking going on during the process of shooting a film, so there are movies going into production that could end up being that much worse when they're released.

Which leads me to this thought: Although I support the writers' side in this conflict, I don't support all of them.

X3's Kid Omega To Join Lost Cast

It has been revealed that Ken Leung is set to join the cast of Lost for the show's upcoming fourth season, presumably beginning with the February 2008 season premiere. Pop culture fans may recognise Leung as Kid Omega from last year's wonderfully solid X-Men: The Last Stand or as mentally unstable Carter Chong on an episode of The Sopranos.

The report from TV Guide suggests the actor - who apparently "turned heads" in his role on the HBO series - will play the role of "a brilliant mathematician who is capable of great insights and has a tremendous knowledge across various scientific fields."

Lost: Comic-Con Revelations!

With enough time for a child to be conceived and carried to term between seasons, Lost fans are currently in the midst of what is surely one of the longest waits for answers in television history. Thankfully, writers and executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse made an appearance at San Diego Comic-Con on Thursday to offer a small idea of what to expect over the coming seasons.

Among the revelations was the announcement that Michael Perrineau will be returning as a regular cast member in his role of Michael, as well as the somewhat predictable news that future seasons will feature more "flash-forwards" similar to the third season finale.

Next Season Pace Of Jericho = Opposite Of Lost

According to CBS, the shortened second season of Jericho will compress an entire 22 season storyline into just seven episodes.

This latest news indicates that they're still assuming the worst, and that the show will not go beyond seven episodes when it returns to the air. I'm happy to hear this because it would be the greatest of ironies if they were to get cocky and build another cliffhanger into the seventh episode only to have things end the same way again.

Screen Rant Weekly Podcast - June 14, 2007

Just a grab bag of stuff from the last week and half including my server crash, thoughts on Fantastic Four 2 being rated PG, Jericho's return, Lost's ending, why I'm worried about the recently announced Captain America movie, and more!

Lost Writers Have An Ending - Well I Sure HOPE So

I guess the writers of Lost locked themselves away for a few days to map out the remaining seasons of the mystery show, and one of the things they came up with was:

The Ending

On the one hand, I'm happy to hear that.. but on the other, didn't they have an ending in mind when they created the show? See, now that scares me and reflects a lot of the online chatter early last season that these guys were just making things up as they went along.

Screen Rant Weekly Podcast - May 26, 2007

Hey folks! Another weekly summary for you including news on the "Save Jericho" campaign, the reveal of Heath Ledger as The Joker from The Dark Knight, Iron Man news and the season finales of Lost and Heroes.

I hope you enjoy the smooth listening sounds of the audio version of Screen Rant. ;-)

powered by ODEO

Lost Season 3 Finale

So Season Three of Lost is finally over and the finale was definitely a mind-bender.

I've complained about Lost here at Screen Rant for a long time, but I have to admit that in the last half dozen episodes or so it seems that the producers/writers have responded to viewer complaints about the show and it's improved considerably, getting back to the quality level of the first season. During the first half of this season Lost was looking like it was losing it's momentum, especially with the painfully drawn out, go-nowhere captured Jack/Kate/Sawyer saga. But once they dumped that storyline and got us back to the beach, the show took a turn for the better.

Spoilers follow, so if you haven't seen it, I would recommend you stop reading.

CBS Slams Fans With Jericho Cancellation

I was all set to go off with a really heinous rant on CBS concerning the Jericho cancellation, but I just got off the phone with someone in their press office who was really nice so I'll hold back. A little bit.

So it's official that Jericho is off the air. Having just watched the season (and now, series) finale last night I'm here to tell you that I'm really pissed. To just pull the plug on a show after a huge cliffhanger is in my opinion just a plain slap in the face to the viewers that did tune in to the show.

X-Men 4 With Lost Star As Gambit?

According to ShowBizSpy.com, Josh Holloway, who lately has been playing the "kinder and gentler" conman Sawyer on ABC's Lost has stated he's been approached by Fox to play the part of Gambit in X-Men 4.

If this is in fact true, then it confirms that despite the studio announcing that they were done making X-Men movies (yeah, right) they are indeed going ahead with another sequel.

Lost To Finally End In 2010 = Bad Decision

With fears of losing further audience numbers to "Never-Ending Mystery Syndrome", the producers of Lost have selected a figure for a finite number of episodes, allowing them to craft an overall story arc instead of plodding (or should I say "plotting"?) from season to season. After the current season ends, there will be 48 more episodes of ABC's hit show Lost broadcast.

Although I personally think that 48 more episodes is WAY too many to conclude this story and finally get the answer to the mysteries of the island, at least putting a solid number on this is a good thing. Of course, leave it up to the studio execs to "improve" the producers' decision with a totally dumb idea.

Heroes Freaking ROCKS!

All you Lost fanboy losers out there: you can keep that go-nowhere, yank my chain show... NBC's Heroes is where it's at, baby!

If you're not watching it already, hopefully between now and April 23rd (when the show picks up again) you'll have a chance to watch it in reruns. Just kinda, sorta kidding about the fanboy loser comment, BTW. :-) It's not our fault if we got sucked into the bottomless pit that is Lost. but if you're still defending it, well... if the shoe fits.

Heroes is one of the shows that was spawned by the success of the go-nowhere and give few answers Lost last season, and has completely surpassed it in terms of story, character development and sheer drop-your-jaw entertainment value.

Lost: The Tattoo Episode?

I gotta tell ya... the ONLY reason I'm hanging in there with Lost is that I'm a coward. I'm afraid that the week after I stop watching there will be some huge revelation that will finally make sticking with this damned show worthwhile.

In the meantime, we continue to suffer...

At the end of last week's episode, the TV version of "Movie Trailer Announcer Guy" says dramatically that three mysteries will be revealed in this week's episode.

Yeah, right.

"Lost" Producers Getting A Clue?

Almost two years ago I commented on the fact that the producers of Lost stated they had an 8 year arc in mind for the show, and how that was a really bad idea. Today in Variety comes a story stating that the execs in charge are getting antsy about defining when the show will end and that they in fact do not want to end up going off the air like X-Files. By the time that show ended, did anyone, including the majority of hard-core fans of the show, even care anymore?

A sign that they may be "getting it" comes from executive producer Carlton Cruse:

"The worst point is when a show ends and no one cares. We don't want that to happen. We want to make the shows good for as long as we do the show."

I've made the Lost/X-Files comparison here more than once and it's good to hear that the folks in charge finally have that issue showing up on their radar. They would do best not to ignore it and if it were up to me I would wrap this whole thing up by the end of next season at the latest.

A "Lost" Star Trek With The Original Crew

Ok, I realize I did an April Fool's post about the next movie moving forward with Peter Jackson as director and that the movie would have a young Kirk, Spock and McCoy as characters.

It turns out I was half right.

According to Variety, there will be a Star Trek 11 and it will revolve around the original series crew during their younger days. That in itself is very cool news, as it's the plotline of favor among Trek fans around the world. Of course if it were in the hands of the folks that brought us "Insurrection" and "Nemesis" that would cancel out any excitement.

But Paramount is bringing in fresh, hot blood on this one folks...

"Lost" for 8 years?

In a recent interview, Harold Perrineau from the cast of Lost stated that J.J. Abrams and Damon Lindelof (writers/producers of the show) have mentioned that they have an eight year story arc in mind.

Eight years?

I'm sorry, but I don't think that I could stand to be teased that long before finding the answer to the big mystery that ties everything together. Heck, I groaned when I found out it was going to be picked up for another season, much less 5-7 seasons more after that. (BTW, there is no word that the series will actually go on that long for sure)

Chris Carter and X-Files showed that you can only string people along and yank their chains for so long before they finally give up on a show and just say: "Whatever".

I don't know... I think the angle used by the writers and producers of 24 is much more sustainable: Taking essentially the same characters and every season putting them in a different situation. Even that has the possibility of getting old, but the 24 team are extremely adept at throwing in twists, turns and cliffhangers that keep it (for me, anyway) fresh and exciting.

I always thought the concept of Lost was well-suited to a one season or maybe two season run, but that's it.

Thanks to Dark Horizons for the heads-up.

"Lost" creator reassures fans

In an interview with Sci Fi Wire Damon Lindelof, co-creator of ABC's Lost emphasized that he and producers J.J. Abrams and Bryan Burk do already have the answers to all the mysteries on the island, and it's just a question of when those answers will be revealed.

There's a creeping sensation seeping into the minds of some fans of the popular show that is giving them a feeling of deja vu, and it's making them (and me) uneasy. It's the memory of a great show that ended up going nowhere.

That show was called The X-Files.

If you're a regular reader here you've seen my rants on that show and the upcoming film. The fear here is that we could be in for the same sort of convoluted, go-nowhere-with-no-resolution storyline.

Sure Lost is interesting and fun to watch, but in the end it needs to make sense. The various threads need to come together to form a cohesive (and satisfying) whole. If the producers and writers manage to do that with what they've created it will be incredibly awesome. But if they don't... and just keep leading us down a path that doesn't really go anywhere, watch out for fan backlash and plummeting ratings.