Hasbro, the manufacturers of the neo-classic Star Wars toys as well as the toys from Episode I, has issued a press release which may mean they’ve gotten the hint from disgruntled collectors. In September, new figures will be packaged in a new blister card featuring graphic elements from the classic trilogy and Phantom Menace. But best of all, Hasbro has announced a price drop of a full dollar and their photos of the new packaging do not show any evidence of the much lamented price-raising Commtech chips. Replacing the chips will be “Jedi Fact File” trading cards with color photos and character information.
Source: Hasbro

Activision is about a week away from unleashing Star Trek: Invasion, a 3-D space shooter based on the Colony Wars engine. The game will put the player in the role of a Red Squad pilot – Starfleet Academy’s elite cadet flight squad – under the command of Lt. Commander Worf (voiced by Michael Dorn). The game will include a grueling training course followed by an unfolding mission storyline involving a threat to Federation security. Is it the Romulans? Are the Borg involved? Is the Dominion trying to re-ignite a war? Sign on for a high-risk mission with Worf and find out. By all accounts in various previews, Star Trek: Invasion has some of the best 3-D action and some of the coolest lighting and pyro effects ever seen in a Playstation game.
Source: Activision

The landmark final episode of William Hartnell’s reign as the original Doctor Who, The Tenth Planet, is slated for an October release by BBC Video – but this release date applies only to the domestic release in the U.K. BBC Video and Warner Bros. are still working out a deal for Warners to take over distribution of BBC titles in North America, which is already lagging over a quarter of a year behind the British releases. The Tenth Planet, the first adventure in which the Doctor regenerates, will be released in a two-tape box set with its 1985 sequel, Attack of the Cybermen (starring Colin Baker as the Sixth Doctor). As many fans know, the original master print of the fourth of Tenth Planet‘s four episodes has been missing for decades. To compensate for this, the Doctor Who Restoration Team is putting together a photographic reconstruction, showing still photos in time with the action on the still-existing audio track. The reconstructed episode four will be as close to full-motion as a slide show can be, and will also feature a few brief snippets of actual recovered film sequences (one of which is the historic regeneration sequence).
Source: BBC Worldwide

October’s forthcoming DVD release of Star Trek: The Motion Picture looks like it will have surprises aplenty in store for those of us who have grown accustomed to Paramount’s feature-barren DVD releases. Paramount reps revealed at a recent convention that Foundation Imaging, the orignial B5 effects house which has provided CGI for numerous episodes of Star Trek: Voyager and Deep Space Nine, will be cleaning up and restoring existing visual effects for The Motion Picture – and adding effects to never-before-seen unfinished action scenes which were dropped from the movie’s theatrical edit. This announcement may also mean that Foundation will fill out with CGI those scenes from the pan & scan home video version which were never finished in widescreen for the theatrical release. Those “orphan” scenes have long been regarded as a vast improvement to the movie, but have never been seen in widescreen because of unfinished sets, effects, and so forth – a deficiency which Foundation could certainly correct. The addition of the action scenes and other scenes may bring The Motion Picture to a 2:40:00 run time – and bring it closer to the original vision of director Robert Wise. There’s no word on commentaries or other bonus material, or whether the original version of the film will be viewable separately (a la the recent 20th Century Fox DVDs of Independence Day and The Abyss).
Sources: TrekWeb, DVDfile.com

The WB’s Buffy The Vampire Slayer earned an impressive number of nominations for a genre series in this year’s Emmy Awards. Here are the categories in which SF shows placed. (more…)

To fill the shoes of the abducted Mulder in what may be the final season of The X-Files, Robert Patrick of Terminator 2 fame has been tapped to play FBI Agent John Doggett. The new character will appear in all 20 episodes of the slightly abbreviated season, while David Duchovny will only appear in 11. Numerous actors were rumored to have tried out for the new role, including Bruce Campbell and Chris Noth.
Source: Associated Press

Ain’t It Cool News has reported that Netter Digital Entertainment, Inc., the special effects house responsible for the final two seasons of Babylon 5, the four B5 movies aired on TNT and Crusade, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Despite such ongoing work as the Voltron: The Third Dimension animated series and post-production and FX work for the Sci-Fi Channel’s upcoming Dune miniseries, NDEI apparently isn’t attracting enough business to keep its doors open in its present state. NDEI was founded by Doug Netter, who served as executive producer on every episode, movie and spin-off of B5.
Source: Ain’t It Cool News

And scripts. Doug Naylor, co-creator of the BBC’s Red Dwarf, has compiled all eight of the show’s eighth season scripts into a book with heaps of background information, photos and more. The eight scripts include scenes which were either filmed but edited out, or were never filmed. Click here to order the Red Dwarf VIII book from theLogBook.com Store. It’s the next best thing to a new season of the show…of which, by the way, there is no word. Not much news on the nearly-vaporware feature film, either. Funny, that.

As of next week, theLogBook.com will be going to a four-day-a-week schedule. Updates will be posted on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, with news updated on Sunday.

The Sci-Fi Channel has announced that this fall’s airing of Babylon 5 on their network will be the show’s premiere in its native widescreen, letterboxed format. The series will begin on September 25th at 6:00pm central time with the first episode. On September 24th, the night before the premiere, the Sci-Fi Channel’s Sciography series will profile the making, the creators and the stars of Babylon 5. (theLogBook.com provided Sciography with photographic material for the production, by the way.) Aside from a U.K.-only box set release of the four TNT movies, this will be Babylon 5′s first appearance in widescreen. Set your VCRs – and feel free to use theLogBook.com’s episode guides to help you organize your collection.
Source: The Sci-Fi Channel

Proving that some earlier fan rumors were actually correct, Christopher Lee and former NYPD Blue star Jimmy Smits have been signed to appear in Star Wars Episode II - and Smits is said to have landed the pivotal role of Senator Bail Organa of Alderaan. Other recent additions include Joel Edgerton and Bonnie Piesse as the young Owen and Beru, and The Matrix‘s Matt Doran as – according to Lucasfilm – “an unsavory troublemaker.” Maybe he’ll keep his eyes off of the woman in the red dress this time. Frequent Xena guest star Jay Laga’aia will also be seen in the next Star Wars film, though no role has been announced. Returning to reprise their Episode I roles will be Andy Secombe (Watto), Pernilla August (Shmi Skywalker), Silas Carson (Ki-Adi Mundi), and – naturally – Frank Oz (Yoda).
Sources: Daily Variety and the official Star Wars web site

Star Trek: Voyager executive producer Brannon Braga has signed a new three-year deal with Paramount. Braga’s new contract not only locks him in as co-creator and executive producer of the next Star Trek spinoff, but also has him developing and producing other projects for Paramount (though no more details about what may in the pipeline are forthcoming). The new contract will see him pulling in something in the upper seven-digit bracket. Who among us wouldn’t like that kind of money just to run the Trek franchise into the ground?
Source: Daily Variety

The sixth season of Xena: Warrior Princess will kick off with an episode written by fan writer Melissa H. Good. Earlier this year, Melissa “Missy” Good made the transition from fan fic to freelance scriptwriter; the Xena season premiere is her second script for the series.

Liam Neeson, Star Wars Episode I‘s Qui-Gon Jinn, had a run-in with a deer while riding his motorcycle. The deer didn’t survive the encounter, but Neeson, despite breaking his pelvis and suffering other injuries, will recover. Remember, motorists: deer is the path to the dark side.

Once again, various production delays and other factors have caused Big Finish to rearrange its release schedule for this year’s Audio Adventures. Dalek Empire: The Mutant Phase, the final chapter in the Dalek Empire trilogy, has been pushed back to December. (The second story in that trilogy, The Apocalypse Element, will hit the shelves on schedule next month. Lalla Ward guest stars as Romana.) The Mutant Phase‘s October slot is now filled by Paul Cornell’s highly-anticipated The Summoning, which will bring the seventh Doctor and Ace together with Bernice Summerfield for their first non-novel adventure. Also, Big Finish hints that negotiations are already underway to engage Paul McGann (the eighth Doctor) for another handful of audio adventures, likely for release late in 2001 or early in 2002.
Source: Big Finish Productions