Analysis: Double Standards, Conflicts of Interest and more... All Par For The Course In Today's AFL Media?

In what must be one of the most low-key, yet heated rivalries in the AFL, Sam Newman has thrown another barb at Before the Game panelist Samantha Lane.

Channel Ten was successfully sued this week for $85,000 after Nicole Cornes accused Mick Molloy of damaging her character after he implied that she slept with an AFL player.

Sam Newman, obviously still holding a grudge after she wrote a critical piece slamming the Footy Show for their treatment of women, blasted Samantha Lane tonight for not writing a similarly condemnatory piece about her colleague Mick Molloy (she sits next to him on the Ten program).

News: Top Gear Season 17 Coming Soon to Nine

Australian Top Gear fans can rest easy- the show's seventeenth season, which began just over two weeks ago in the UK, will finally have an airdate in Australia.

Today Nine have begun airing their "The best is still to come" promos, which feature a montage of the second half of the year's shows, including Underbelly: Razor, Hamish and Andy's Gap Year, Top Design and Bear Gryll's Worst Case Scenario.

There is also a mention of new Top Gear, though, which tells us it isn't far away.

It won't be seen for the next two weeks but my tip is....

News: Sandra Bullock joins Life Too Short

[/caption]

Sandra Bullock will join the growing list of A-list celebrities on Ricky Gervais' new mockumentary Life's Too Short.

She is the next star to be announced, after Sting, last month.

News: Can of Worms Episode 2 Guests

Following Can of Worms' lukewarm reception after its first episode, it has today released its guest-list for episode 2.

The guests are Don Burke, Tom Ballard and Jessica Rowe.

News: Top Gear Season 17 Episode 4 Details

From TVRage, we have the latest synopsis for the seventeenth season of Top Gear. Quite significantly, Rowan Atkinson will be making his first appearance on the show (presumably he will be promoting his latest flick Johnny English Reborn).

Renewal and Cancellation Wrap: Winners and Losers Renewed!

Seven's new drama series Winners and Losers has today been renewed by Channel Seven for a second season!

News: Video Hits Axed (Reportedly)

Today The Daily Telegraph reports that music video stalwart Video Hits has been axed.

News: Samantha Armytage kicked off Dancing with the Stars + Opinion

The competition is heating up... etc. etc.

News: Top Gear Season 17 Episode 2 and 3 Guests, Challenges, Reviews

After Episode 1 of Season 17 featured Alice Cooper in the "Reasonably Priced Car", as well as a tribute to the Jaguar E-Type and reviews of the Marauder, BMW 1 Series M Coupe and Mini John Cooper Works WRC, the hijinks for episodes 2 and 3 have been revealed.

AU News: Misfits S2, Friday Night Lights S1, Miranda Coming to ABC2

A day after the Green Guide sung the praises of the "multichannels", the ABC2 have made a slew of announcements letting people know why these channels have enjoyed a surge in popularity.

News: An Idiot Abroad Season 2 to Premiere in September

Everyone's favourite "idiot" Karl Pilkington will be back on UK screens this September.

News: Hung Season 3 To Premiere in October

HBO has finally released a trailer for Season 3 of Hung, starring Thomas Jane. Check it out above. It is typically raunchy and suggestive, but features no new footage. And "ready for more"? Could HBO be any more vague? Anyway, it's something, and at least there's some information about when it will premiere; sometime in October, according to HBO in this recent tweet.

News: James Spader closing in on The Office boss job

The long and arduous process of deciding who should replace Steve Carell in the hit NBC comedy The Office, and it's firming as James Spader, who appeared as Robert California in the season finale.
More after the jump!

News: "Life's Too Short" Teaser Trailer Released (New Gervais Sitcom)

Here's the teaser trailer for the latest Ricky Gervais/Stephen Merchant project entitled Life's Too Short.

Of course, as the series is still being filmed, there is no actual footage of the show, however you do get to see series star Warwick Davis along with the two comic geniuses in Gervais and Merchant.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyrOr24hdEY&w=560&h=349]
The show itself tells the story of Warwick Davis, a short statured man who runs a talent agency for other short statured actors... Which he also does in real life.

Gervais and Merchant will also play themselves in the show, which will again be in a similar "mockumentary" style to the one pioneered in The Office.

Interestingly, in this trailer Gervais describes it as a cross between Extras and The Office.

Notable guest stars in the series will include Johnny Depp, as well as Cat Deeley in a recurring role.

News: Breaking Bad S4 "gets darker and deeper", No Minisodes: Cranston

Bryan Cranston gave an exclusive interview with Collider which should be a must-read for any Breaking Bad fan. I maintain that there is no-one better at summing up the mood and plot direction of a show that the actual actors themselves. Here is what he has to say about the overall arc of the show;
More after the jump!

TV News Wrap: Wednesday June 22

[caption id="attachment_783" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Source: The Hollywood Reporter"][/caption]

• Desperate Housewives will be adding another male regular to the cast in Season 8 (on top of the already great addition of Jonathon Cake as Bree's new love interest).

• Hawaii Five-O will also bag another Lost alumnus in the form of Terry O'Quinn (who played John Locke in the hit ABC show). It's also good to see him on TV in some capacity after the Marc Cherry-helmed Hallelujah pilot fell through earlier this year.

• Mad Men has locked down its most valuable asset in Jon Hamm for another three seasons- virtually assuring that the show will run through to Season 7. However, its future after that is on very shaky ground, with the strong word being that it won't continue much further after its seventh season.

• The Office has given The Hollywood Reporter a peek behind the scenes of its final episode. So check out these pics of Ed Helms, Creed Bratton and John Krasinski at work.

• The Walking Dead has cast (another) racist survivor for its second season, set to return in October 2011. His name is Otis and will be played by Pruitt Taylor Vince of The Mentalist fame.

TV News Wrap: Wednesday June 15

• Showtime's new drama House of Lies is shaping up to be a pretty interesting little show, especially when you consider it stars Australia's Josh Lawson (Thank God You're Here). I also hope, for Ben Schwartz's (Parks and Recreation) sake, that he is able to shed his "Jean-Ralphio" tag. Unfortunately, the Hollywood Reporter had misspelt Josh Lawson's name in this edit- so it's fair to say he's not quite a household name yet?

[caption id="attachment_771" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="We all make mistakes..."][/caption]

• It's the TV off-season in the US, so you have to take what you can get here, but Michael Ausiello at TVLine reports that Breaking In will probably not get a reprieve after being axed a short time ago.

• He also reports that Catherine Tate will probably not be the new boss on "The Office". This is very disappointing for some who were holding out hope for Tate to shake things up a bit, but I'd wait just a bit longer before you start jumping to any conclusions about the new boss (let's face it, if it's not her, it would only be between James Spader, Ed Helms and Craig Robinson).

• So, Fran Drescher (The Nanny) has a new show on TVLand entitled "Happily Divorced", which you could almost brush off as another "New Christine" if it wasn't for the semi-interesting fact that it's based on her life in that she and her husband split because he was gay. Hey, if it worked for "Raymond", right?

In Australian news

• You've got to admit that that the (non-?) story about comedian James Brechney popping up on Q and A posing as a climate change-skeptic was a doozy, for a number of reasons. I should state that while I would like to admit to picking him as a fake, I didn't; and let that be a credit to his comedic/acting skills. But at least I didn't jump up and down frothing at the mouth like half of Twitter did on Monday night- especially after he stated that climate change was "just a theory" like gravity. The small problem with his prank/political protest was that it wasn't really that far from what a sceptic would normally say, which caused the panel members to take him all too seriously. Garrett must be red-faced now, as now he appears to be pandering to the questioner- so probably the biggest indictment is on the ABC program. But kudos should go to Brechney for trying to prove a point- he has definitely come out on top. Here's the clip:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KkWJYWtk3o]

TV News Wrap: Wednesday June 1

• Anticipation for the fourth season of Breaking Bad is building slowly but surely. The premiere, titled "El Topo" is still a month and a half away, but there have been hints as to what the season might entail. Here is the trailer that was released today. It is the version from YouTube for Australian viewers, as other sites contain geographic restrictions

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alFsfEUtDmQ]

• There's also a nifty little interview with series creator Vince Gilligan over at EW. Here are the key points to take out of it:

“(Walt) journeys deeper into this criminal underworld, and then much of season 4 is Walt’s effort to get out from under and overcome in a very dangerous battle of wills.”

"... Jesse is morphing into yet another person within himself, just struggling with his inner demons. It’s pretty intense."

"(Jesse's upcoming relationship with a familiar face is) a budding romance in the drug world... It’s a beautiful thing, and I know people will like it.”

“... even though things look pretty dire (for Hank) in the early going, he will get his mojo back as the season progresses in some fashion, although probably not in the fashion that you’d expect"

“People are going to have nightmares about Gus Fring,”

• Fans of the lavish HBO drama Boardwalk Empire will enjoy this behind-the-scenes peek as well as the Season 2 plot hints in this video from HBO itself. The second season has just begun filming, with i

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scsqhYeQmck]

• Is Patrick Dempsey leaving Grey's Anatomy at the end of Season Eight or not? Well, the answer so far is pretty well up in the air, as it turns out that most of the cast have their contracts expiring at the end of the season. What this means for the show and people's favourite characters is anyone's guess, but it means that if you're a fan of the show, you would be getting very nervous.

Dexter Season 6 Gossip (Spoilers)

Just some interesting tidbits floating around regarding Season 6 of Dexter.

This great Dexter news blog has reported that Dexter Season 6 is filming in front of a local preschool. This is in keeping with Michael Ausiello's theory of a time-jump which would see Dexter's son Harrison a bit older and in pre-school.

Screen Junkies also has picked up on the fact that Brea Grant has joined the cast of Season 6... she has also hinted that she will be in a white lab coat.

This will be added to the DEXTER SHOW FILE of course.

TV News Wrap: Friday May 27

Not much in the way of news today... just some notable guest-casting coups;

• James Van Der Beek ("Dawson's Creek") is heading to Law and Order: SVU. He will also be appearing on the new TNT show Franklin and Bash.

• Martin Short and Alan Quinn will also pop up on Season 7 of the Showtime series Weeds.

• Star of Mad Men, Jon Hamm, will direct the first episode of the fifth season of the hit AMC show. Of course, you'll have to wait until March 2012 to see it though.

AUSTRALIAN NEWS

• You can watch Hamish and Andy's going away drinks party on the Herald Sun website from 6PM today. They will fly to the US to produce their show, Hamish and Andy's Gap Year for Channel Nine.

• I can't believe that there's even speculation that someone will replace Adam Hills on Spicks and Specks for a number of reasons. 1) Because the combination of Adam, Myf and Alan is the show, when one element is taken out, it ceases to be Spicks and Specks; 2) Even if they tried, there would almost certainly be backlash, whoever they chose to replace him and 3) ABC would not even consider it because of these reasons, at least not for a couple of years.