Quantum NCIS Enterprise

OH BOY!

The latest casting news for the potential new spinoff in the NCIS franchise NCIS: New Orleans has been announced. Scott Bakula has been cast as team leader Special Agent Pride. Pride is described as a man who “embodies New Orleans" and is driven by the "need to do what’s right and does it all with warmth, passion, strength and humor." He is also apparently an old associate of Gibbs (Marc Harmon) from the NIS (Naval Investigative Service) days.

Special Agent Pride and his team will debut this spring in a two-part story on the current flagship show NCIS as a backdoor spinoff pilot. NCIS itself is a spinoff from the mother flagship show JAG.

Speaking of JAG Zoe McLellan (P.O. Jennifer Coates) has been cast as Special Agent Brody on Pride's team. Also cast is CCH Pounder (Mrs. Irene Frederic from Warehouse 13) who will play medical examiner Dr. Wade. Another field agent named LaSalle has yet to be cast, or at least the casting has yet to be announced for that character.

I have mentioned in this blog and elsewhere that I really don't think there needs to be three NCIS shows right now. This show, however, seems more interesting and has a bigger named star to anchor the potential series than the previous spinoff attempt (from NCIS: Los Angeles) NCIS: Red. I'm a big NCIS fan and a big fan of Scott Bakula as well as a huge Warehouse 13 fan. Even though I don't agree with the plans for a new series I will end up watching, supporting and probably enjoying NCIS: New Orleans.

Related Links:
'NCIS: New Orleans' casts 'JAG' actress - Entertainment Weekly
'NCIS' scoop: Scott Bakula to star in new spinoff - Entertainment Weekly
'JAG' Alum Set as Female Lead in CBS' 'NCIS' New Orleans Spinoff - The Hollywood Reporter
NCIS: New Orleans? - Kirk's Knook (This blog right here)
Bakula cast in lead role of 'NCIS' New Orleans spinoff - New York Post
Bakula leads cast of 'NCIS' New Orleans episodes - USA Today

Rewind On Syfy

A few weeks back (now closer to a month) I stumbled upon a one-shot time travel sci-fi show. There was very little promo for it I only just found out about it because I was watching G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra on Sci-Fi Channel, and they had a few very brief "up next" promos. Apparently this practice of little or no pre-promotion is called "Burn Off" (see related links at end of this post) a practice that channel does that really really sucks. The quick promos I did see interested me because it looked like the plot was exclusively a version of Seven Days.

Rewind the "pilot" movie (possible regular series?) on Syfy. Pretty good, it was OK, not great but OK much of it has been done time and time again (pardon the semi-intentional pun). Initially the plot is like Seven Days a military (or ex-military) misfit is recruited for a secret Military funded time-travel program to help correct a horrible event (in this case New York gets nuked). The mix of Military and Non-Military is sort of like Quantum Leap and Stargate, as is the time travel devise/wormhole a "time-stream" where the "destinations" are random, or maybe it more like The Time Tunnel? Oh and the amount of time the "gate" or wormhole is open for varies and can only be estimated.

The cast included: Jeff Fahey as the "Mr. Fix-It" engineer character who developed some of the technology/equipment the team uses. The team of travelers includes Shane McRea as the main "misfit" who is recruited to fill out the team, Jennifer Ferrin the Doctor/Scientist in charge of the technical team and one of the driving forces of the project and Robbie Jones as an associate of McRea's character and one of the military members assigned to the project. One of the supporting characters was a historian/researcher who seemed to specialize in fashion history played by Keisha Castle-Hughes she was my favorite character.

I hope that sometime they release this onto DVD even though it was a failed series pilot episode.

Related links:
Lost vet, David Cronenberg join Syfy's time travel series Rewind - Blastr
Syfy's Rewind Pilot: We Saw It, Now What's Next?- KSiteTV
Syfy Drops Time-Travel Show Rewind - Sci-Fi Stream
Rewind - TV Rage (source of the screen shot images I used)

Source Code: DVD Review

Colter Stevens: It's the same dream, but it's different!
Christina Warren: Deep. I hope it's different. I feel the same way.

Source Code (2011) PG-13

****

WARNING: This review might contain SPOILERS!

Source Code - When I first saw trailers for this film my first reaction was the plot was similar to the main plot device for the television show Seven Days, because of the time limit of how far back the "time traveler" goes, except it isn't quite the same thing. In the show it was the technology that limited the trips to only 7 days into the past, in this movie the main character goes back to earlier in the day but is limited to 8 minutes in the past due to the "source code" which is more like going into a Matrix of some kind than a time travel machine. I also saw similarities to the show Quantum Leap starring Scott Bakula who makes a vocal appearance in this film as the main character's father in a nod to Quantum Leap. The main character or at least his mind sort of "leaps" into another character via the technology of the "source code".

Bare with me here for a moment. The "technology" or science that allows for source code traveling is more sort of a biotechnology than mechanical technology. The basic gist is that after a person is clinically dead there is still some brain activity for approximately eight minutes after death. The source code technology allows someone to tap into or "leap" into that persons final memories and allows for them to "live in" that person's final moments of life. It also allows the "leaper" to go back multiple times. They don't state a specific number of leap attempts that can be made but they seem to indicate there are limits, due to the deterioration of the dead subjects brain activity.

Jake Gyllenhaal plays Colter Stevens the protagonist a US Army helicopter pilot who last recalls being stationed in Afghanistan and the source code "leaper". He wakes up on a train as someone else, who he later learns is one of the victims on the train when it is blown up by a terrorist outside of Chicago and that it was believed to be just the beginning of a bigger terrifying plan. It was determined that the train had been bombed remotely by a former passenger on the train. Colter's mission is to find out who bombed the train and stop them before more bombs go off. Along the way he learns that he is in the body of a man named Sean Frentress and the woman who is sitting across from him is a friend of Sean's named Christina Warren (Michelle Monaghan).

After the bomb goes off Colter finds himself in a dark chamber that slightly resembles a larger version of his copter's cockpit. He learns that the isolation chamber he is in is part of some military operation. He is told he is in a place called "belegerd castle" a part of some experiment called "The Source Code" by a female Captain Goodwin (Vera Farmiga). Goodwin briefs him on his mission to locate the bomb and try to determin who put it there. Just when he thinks he knows what is going on he is sent back onboard the train to relive "his" or rather Sean's last 8 minutes. Along the way Colter meets the creator of The Source Code Project a Dr. Rutledge (Jeffrey Wright).

Colter falls in love with Christina and then his main goal is to figure out how he can save her and the other passengers. Rutledge and Goodwin inform him that stopping the bombing is NOT his mission and that he needs to concentrate on finding the bomber. Of course he does manage to find a way to save the day and change the future a bit.

I really enjoyed this film. The time limit of the traveling reminded me as I said of Seven Days. Colter's waking in the body of someone else reminded me of Quantum Leap. There is even a slight nod to the show both in the casting of Scott Bakula as Colter's father and a scene with a mirror when Colter first learns he is in another body.
Both of the main actresses Monaghan and Farmiga are beautiful and give great performances. The interaction between Monaghan and Gyllenhaal was also very good. They have a great chemistry which shows and in the extras on the DVD is talked about by the actors and the director.

Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Monaghan, Vera Farmiga

Directed by: Duncan Jones

Summit Entertainment

DVD Release Date: 26 July 2011

Region 1

1 Disc - 93 Minutes

Voyagers on DVD Today!

Another WOOOOOOOHHWWWHHOOOOOOOO!
The early 1980s TV show The Voyagers about a bumbling time-traveler and a 12 year-old kid who joins him in his travels who fix problems in history for the better. It is the same premise as Quantum Leap (Time-Traveler "lost" in time trying to fix things for the better with no control over where or when he arrives). I am tempted to get it today, but I really should wait until at least after this friday which is payday.