So I finally caught up on Dollhouse, and...

....it's not too bad.

Some may say, "Why'd it take you so long to watch it?" Some may say, "You aren't helping the show by not watching it until now." Some may not realize how the nielson ratings work, apparently. To those people I say, it just didn't interest me at all. It actually looked kind of boring from everything I saw about it.

Anywho, the show's not bad. It got off really, really slow. Just like most of what Whedon does, it took a slow progression to get the storyline and the characters to be full and interesting. I think the last couple episodes have done that. Really since episode 6, "Man on the Street". Before that episode, the first 5 are pretty close to throwaway with a little bit of character development thrown in. I imagine if the first 5 weren't there, the last 4 wouldn't have been as good as they ultimately were.

(More after the bump)

I'm probably not going to Dragon*Con this year (I have a wedding and honeymoon to pay for), so this is only for the satisfaction of those attending this year.

Julie Benz has been added to the guest list at Dragon*Con in Atlanta. She joins other Whedonverse alums, James Marsters and Ron Glass thus far. I might be missing a couple people, but I didn't see any others on the official Dragon*Con site.

If I'm not mistaken, this is Julie's second trip to D*C. The only advice I can give her, she probably already knows.....take a big jug of hand sanitizer.

In happier news, today it was announced that late last week, Alyson Hannigan and Alexis Denisof had a baby girl. They named her "Satyana", which I can't pronounce, so it must be a good celebrity baby name.

Congratulations to the new parents.

God, I feel like Ryan Seacrest or some shit.

It's sad that I come back with my first post in months and it's this...

As you probably already know, Andy Hallett passed away on March 29th at the age of 33. He was battling heart disease for the better part of 5 years and finally succumbed to it Sunday night. 

By all accounts, Andy was a good man, always one of the most friendly actors towards the fans. He was big on the convention circuit, and everyone always loved to talk to him. He was down to earth, funny....just an incredibly entertaining guy. I think I speak for everyone at HMC when I say we will all miss him very, very much. Our condolences go out to his friends and family.

It's about time we got some good news from the Dollhouse set. Apparently, Jane Espenson is going to be writing for the show (and probably producing it). Last I heard, they didn't have enough money to bring her along, but it looks like that's changed now that Steven DeKnight is gone as a consulting producer. I'm not sure if that's the reason for the Jane hiring, but it makes sense.

Anyway, Joss posted about this bit of information and a whole load of crap (also - a lot of defending the Fox suits) in a whedonesque post. You can check it out here. 

Good news for Julie Benz fans (and I guess Julie herself) - Showtime has decided to extend it's hit series (2.5 million viewers is considered a hit on Showtime apparently) Dexter for two more seasons.

I personally have not seen a single episode of Dexter, but I'm told it's very, very good. I believe Eric once told me that it's "the best show on television," and I would say that means quite a bit considering Eric watches a lot of TV. 

Showtime has ordered 12 episodes each for Season 4 and 5 (they are currently in Season 3). The show was nominated for 5 Emmys (which is great, but the Emmys have a "best reality show" category, so what's it all really mean?). It also received a 2008 Peabody award. 

News courtesy of Reuters/Hollywood Reporter.

Did I sound enough like Perez Hilton? I don't honestly know, I don't read his crap.

Alyson Hannigan and Alexis Denisof are pregnant with their first child. The baby is due in the spring. No word yet on the gender, but I'm sure a paparazzi will be trying to rummage through the hospital's medical waste trying to find the answers soon enough. Either that, or the couple will get paid by People magazine for pictures of the ultra-sound. Hell, People magazine might pay to do their own vaginal examination. Aren't they close to going that far? I think so.

Congrats to the happy couple. 

Okay, I'm not going to pretend to know anything about "Dragonball Z", because I don't. Really, I don't know much about Anime, except that it comes from Japan and usually each show comes with a ton of merchandise. But when I heard James Marsters was going to be in it, I had to at least take a look....

It would appear that Marsters is the only interesting thing to look at in the film, or at least that's what the trailer made me feel.

The rest of the trailer looks like if a dragonball costume party had sex with a Uwe Boll movie. If you don't know what that means, I'll make it simple....it looked bad.

There's really nothing special in the trailer. Every scene looks like something that's been done before, and done ad nauseum. And what happened to Chow Yun-Fat? Where'd his career go?

Don't take my word for it, check out the trailer below.

The results are in for the latest poll, "What's Your Favorite Joss Whedon Work?"

Buffy The Vampire Slayer - 50.1%
Firefly - 34.3%
Angel - 10.8%
Dr. Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog - 2.6%
Serenity - 1.5%
Buffy The Vampire Slayer (movie) - 0.3%
Titan A.E. - 0.1%
Toy Story - 0.1%
Alien Resurrection - 0%

2088 votes were counted. That might be a record.  I have to give some props to Simon over at Whedonesque for letting everyone know over there that the poll was going on.

What can we determine from the poll? Well, people still generally regard Buffy as their first love, and as one of the best shows of all-time (can't disagree there). The browncoats showed up in full force to give BtVS a challenge. Angel still has a good fanbase. And 55 people haven't been in the fandom too long, because they voted for Dr. Horrible (seriously, you picked a 45-minute web musical over BUFFY, FIREFLY and ANGEL? Really?). 

The new poll will be up shortly. 

Just when you thought they couldn't shill off more crap from Buffy, you stood amazed at the awesome power of merchandisers' completely random ideas....thus you get the "Conversation with Dead People" Board.

I gotta say, that's just clever.

It's a Ouija Board, but of course they can't officially call it that 'cause then they'd be sued by Parker Brothers or whoever the hell owns that board. Anyway, it looks almost exactly like a Ouija board, but with some different art on it and the fact that it's called something else. That looks to be it. 

Dark Horse wants you to know that the board is for "entertainment purposes only," so that means you shouldn't take it seriously when you call your Grandma from the great beyond and she responds by telling you to put on an extra sweater or you'll catch your death of cold.

They're selling this for $29.99. Apparently there's an instruction sheet with all-new comic panels in it. Whether or not those panels are from Buffy is anyone's guess. I think if Dark Horse wants to get into the cheap toy company business they should do what all cheap toymakers do and that's make an ultimately disappointing feature to their products. Instead of a Buffy comic panel in the box, it should be Hellboy or something. That would piss everyone off, and be funny at the same time.

Click Here to check out the specs.