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Giles gets his own show .. on the BBC

 
 
rizla mission
12:31 / 10.07.01
[q]
Move over Sarah Michelle Gellar, America's hit series Buffy the Vampire Slayer is crossing the Channel to England, London's Sunday Times reports. The BBC is reportedly working on a British spinoff of the show, which will feature actor Anthony Stewart Head, known to Buffy-philes as her former watcher, Rupert "Ripper" Giles.

Unlike actor James Marsters, who also sports a British accent as Spike on Buffy, Head really is British and reportedly has already returned to England to begin shooting the new series.

The spinoff, provisionally titled The Watcher, will delve into the mysterious "Watcher" council that guides and oversees the slayers of the world.

Head, who pooh-poohed the idea of a spinoff of his own last September at a film premiere, tells the Times that the new series will be similar in tone to the late British mystery series Cracker, which briefly became an American series of the same name.

According to the Times, the series will be a darker and more adult version of the teen-oriented American original. However, broadcasts of Buffy and its spinoff, Angel, have been protested in Britain due to their violence and sexuality.
[/q]

sounds good to me.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
12:35 / 10.07.01
The article in the Observer on this contained the worst spoiling I have ever seen outside of Kali's beloved posts.

But yes: should be interesting.

[ 10-07-2001: Message edited by: De La Zenith is dead ]
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
12:48 / 10.07.01
Why don't they just bring Doctor Who back?

If the BBC describe it as sci-fi/fantasy it's going to be shit, because they'll give it a budget of about 20p and a packet of rizlas (no pun intended).

Alternatively, they may finance this pretty well, at which point it mysteriously stops being scifi/fantasy and becomes adult grim urban fantasy noir. Either way, I am fully prepared for this to suck. What will be interesting is whether, with production being controlled by the BBC, all the English people are going to seem more English, or whether, because it's being made for the Americans, we're still going to have lots of chimney sweeps called Sebastian.
 
 
Tom Coates
13:44 / 10.07.01
I had the same anxieties. Hopefully it won't be too ridiculously americanised. It could be really good if done like Ultaviolet...
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
12:19 / 11.07.01
If we pray really hard...
 
 
Spatula Clarke
00:29 / 16.07.01
Oo-er. This all sounds mighty iffy. Wobbly cardboard sets and over-acting, here we come.

Or possibly not. As I remember it, the attempt to resurrect Dr Who a few years back was surprisingly good, and that was co-produced by the Beeb.
 
 
rizla mission
08:47 / 16.07.01
Hopefully this show will have enough American money & expertise to not be crap.

But then, the BBC are dreadfully good at turning gold into shite (and vice versa).
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
15:11 / 16.07.01
quote:Originally posted by E Randy Doo Wop:
As I remember it, the attempt to resurrect Dr Who a few years back was surprisingly good, and that was co-produced by the Beeb.


Only in the sense they gave them 20p, Sylvester McCoy and a hearty good luck.

Well, more or less. I think they paid the minimum they could so that Sky wouldn't nick it and show it first, like they'd bother. I'd be very surprised if America would pay much for a show made in Britain, even if it is off of an American franchise, but hey, stranger things have happened. Like that time they had an episode where Buffy didn't have sex and wasn't obsessing about her boyfriend of the time.
 
 
Templar
01:47 / 18.07.01
Whilst I doubt the BBC will ever get sci-right again before they inevitably loose their license fee money and are forced to start competing like everybody else, this might well be good.
Whedon's going to plot. Since he plotted all of Buffy, but didn't write much, this bodes well.
Also, it's been promised an "adult" time slot (whatever) so will hopefully be a much darker kind of series.
But anyway, isn't the reason that Buffy does so much better over here than in the states that... we all want to be American?
 
 
pantone 292
06:02 / 18.07.01
quote: But anyway, isn't the reason that Buffy does so much better over here than in the states that... we all want to be American?
No, we all want to be...vampires...
 
 
Whisky Priestess
06:02 / 18.07.01
No, we all want to be . . . Anthony Stewart Head.


Or at least I do. And let's not forget that equally, Americans all want to be English, (the bright ones anyway). The Special Relationship is entirely founded on culture-envy.

I can see this turning into some horrible embarrassing catastrophe, but I can equally see it being the best thing since sliced Pop Tarts. If (and only if) they get Mike Leigh and Ridley Scott to co-direct, they use bits of London like my own beloved King's Cross and use me as an extra, and they wheel Brit character actors like Jeremy Irons and Robbie Coltrane out of whatever they're doing these days to be eeeevil villains.
 
 
Templar
19:26 / 18.07.01
They could drag Spike in for a guest appearance... only to have all the quaint British people stare at him whenever he talks, trying to fathom just where his accent originates.
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
07:18 / 20.07.01
quote:Originally posted by Whisky Priestess:
No, we all want to be . . . Anthony Stewart Head.


No, we all want to have Anthony Stewart Head.
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
07:19 / 20.07.01
quote:Originally posted by Templar:
They could drag Spike in for a guest appearance... only to have all the quaint British people stare at him whenever he talks, trying to fathom just where his accent originates.


"Hah, you were fooled by my phoney English accent!"
"Oh, I thought you were Australian, like David Bowie!"
 
 
pantone 292
11:07 / 20.07.01
quote: Originally posted by Whisky Priestess:
No, we all want to be . . . Anthony Stewart Head.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

No, we all want to have Anthony Stewart Head

Or indeed giveAnthony Stewart Head.
 
 
The Sinister Haiku Bureau
19:42 / 22.07.01
Ages ago, me and a mate of mine were discussing 'fantasy buffy spin-offs', and we decided that the two best possible ones would be 'Faith: Rogue Slayer' (nuff said) and 'Giles: The wonder years'- a series set in the 70s, with a young Giles, hanging out with ethan, wearing flares, listening to hawkwind and working with a glam/hippy brit slayer. And in the later serieses (seriei?) you could explore the hippy Vs Punk conflict, embodied in two rival slayers (buffy/faith style).
But no, the beeb go and be all modern about it, and ruin an otherwise perfect idea....

But yeah, it could be good. Or it could be crap. There's been zillions of examples of USA versions of classic British TV which the Americans took and turned crap (Red Dwarf USA, for example...um, and others...) It'd be interesting to see what happens when the boot's on the other foot.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
20:12 / 22.07.01
I'd be interested in seeing how anyone could "turn" Red Dwarf crap.

The words 'polish' and 'turd' spring to mind.
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
08:20 / 23.07.01
That's fighting talk. Series 1-4 Quite Good. Series 5, dull, except for the last episode which was one of the best bits of TV ever. Series 6, awful. Series 7, Unbearably bad which I blame mostly in a very unfair way on Chloe Annette. Series 8, Started well, ended badly.
 
 
The Sinister Haiku Bureau
08:20 / 23.07.01
Yeah, what Loz said. I used to love Red Dwarf when I was about 12, but lost interest around series 6-8, which were ok, but mostly a disapointing waste of time. But even if you didn't like it, the fact still remains that it is/was a cult series with a pretty large following, and that the majority of said large following thought that 'Red Dwarf USA' lacked all of the (percieved?) charm of the original.
 
 
Whisky Priestess
10:00 / 23.07.01
Yeah, I know. Three blokes and one computer on a ship. No toothsome women. What's to care?

Buffy spinoffs: I want to see "Harmony at Beverly Hills 90210" where she spends the entire series killing Brenda in a variety of horrific ways.

I want to see Spike meets Billy Idol. In space.

I want to see Sin City, a spinoff starring the Mayor and Michael J Fox (post-Parkinson's). Guest appearances by the entire cast of The West Wing, Charlie Sheen and Robert Downey Jr.
 
 
Saint Keggers
03:56 / 29.07.01
I have this theory that Giles is Jack the Ripper. (yes you heard it here first)
I'd love for them to make the show something like the Young Indiana Jones Chronicles but with a Dark Shadows (or evern those Basil Rathbone Sherlock Holmes movies) feel to it.
And speaking of Dr.WHo, after seeing the pic of him in the outfit, I think Rowan Atkinson would make an amazing Dr.Who.
 
 
Chubby P
13:09 / 02.08.01
quote:Originally posted by See Loz Run, Run Loz Run:
Why don't they just bring Doctor Who back?


Somewhere on the net I read a rumour (I hasten to add I haven't read it else where!) that Anthony Stewart Head was being considered for the role as The Master in a Doctor Who relaunch.
 
  
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