#and cancelled their sdcc panel

[inkyself]

During yesterday SAG-AFTRA press conference a journalist asked:

“What do you say to the fans and consumers that aren’t interested in the strike and just want to see their favourite tv show?” (or something along these lines I don’t recall the precise words)

And Fran Drescher responded with:

“Well, what makes you think they are not interested in what’s happening here? I think that they have an allegiance to all of us because we bring joy and entertainment to their lives […] so I don’t think that your assumption that they don’t really care about anything but being entertained over the summer is the bottom line” and proceded to say how this corporate greed can extend to all fields of works and how we understand that

AND WE DO UNDERSTAND AND WE DO CARE!

I love her so much for this! It makes me sooo mad when the assumption is that, as a consumer, I don’t care about people who make something that I love, because I do, we do! I know for a fact that people in fandoms care so much about the people involved in the creation of every aspect of their favourite piece of media.

Stop infantilising the audience! We are not whiny children and we understand the complexities of this moment. I am sooo happy that she recognised that.

[serpentarius]

[bronwynn]

oh it's going down

Along with stepping away from all film and television productions worldwide, actors will not be permitted to take part in promotional work of any kind, including press junkets, film premieres, and fan events like San Diego Comic-Con.

Sources also say that SAG-AFTRA has informed publicists that any scheduled press or acting work after a strike is ordered must be cancelled. SAG-AFTRA members are also not permitted to promote any work on social media, as that is considered publicity.

Actors are permitted to attend the pop culture convention as long as they don’t take part in any panels that promote a specific film or television show or discuss any current or future work. While attendance is allowed, individuals with knowledge of the publicist meeting tell TheWrap that SAG-AFTRA would prefer that its members completely skip the event [SDCC] later this month.

[avatar-news]

The official Avatar: The Last Airbender soundtrack is finally being released this year on digital and vinyl!

After 15 long years, the much anticipated official ATLA soundtrack release is finally happening!

Check out the official announcement from Animation Magazine:

Nickelodeon and Republic Records: Kids & Family announced the long-awaited release of Avatar: The Last Airbender – Book 1: Water (Music from the Animated Series) on digital and vinyl. The album, featuring an updated and re-recorded score from the first season of the series, is now available to pre-order and will be released in November, with the first single, “Aang Becomes Ocean,” releasing on Friday, July 28. Emmy Award-winning composer and musician Jeremy Zuckerman, who composed the music for the award-winning animated Nickelodeon series, has expanded his original compositions and employed a full orchestra for Avatar: The Last Airbender – Book 1: Water (Music from the Animated Series). The original album artwork was created by Bryan Konietzko, co-creator and art director of Avatar: The Last Airbender and co-Chief Creative Officer of Avatar Studios. Nickelodeon’s Avatar: The Last Airbender is co-created by Konietzko and Michael DiMartino. The series ran for three seasons (61 episodes), from February 2005 to July 2008 and was honored with a Peabody Award and Primetime Emmy, along with multiple Annie Awards and Genesis Awards. Avatar: The Last Airbender follows the adventures of the main protagonist Aang and his friends, who must defeat Fire Lord Ozai and end the Hundred Year War to restore balance to the Four Nations. Pre-save Avatar: The Last Airbender – Book 1: Water (Music from the Animated Series) to Spotify or Apple Music here.

It's possible this was meant to be revealed at the Avatar panel at SDCC today, which was canceled due to the SAG-AFTRA strike.

[dailycass-cain]

Can you tell us more about Gabrych and the end of the 2000 run? Why was it cancelled?

Near the end of the comic book event "Infinite Crisis", Batgirl Vol. 1 was axed. This was not due to low sales (several DC Comics at the time were selling worse and continued on when the relaunch "One Year Later" program was to hit) but for a rather sexist reason.

Back in 2010, the inker for Batgirl Vol. 1, Jesse Delperdang, posted on Deviantart the real reason the series was canceled, "canceled to make room for the coming Batwoman."

That "coming Batwoman" was an ongoing series by Devin Grayson, and would never see the light of day (DC got cold feet when the character got more publicity than they realized and decided to retool the character (which we got with Greg Rucka and J.H. Williams III over in Detective Comics a few years later).

Because more than "one female bat comic" was one too many. Not only that but just last year Dan DiDio posted on Facebook the original outline he had for "OYL" regarding Cass:

Of course, DiDio always changed his mind and instead, we got the racist caricature in OYL. Nor would this be the last time DiDio would change his thoughts on what to do with Cass (2009, 2011, and 2016. Each a can of worms of themselves).

So that's why Batgirl Vol. 1 was canceled, due to sexism.

As for Gabrych, he continued to work with DC until an Omega Men mini in 2006-2007 and began to go back to his life outside DC Comics. He did come back to write a 2010 graphic novel Frogtown for the Vertigo label.

The thing is, DC Editorial under DiDio was a nasty business. Sometimes you followed the edicts or didn't and walked altogether (Kelley Puckett for a brief run with Supergirl Vol. 5 in 2008 and Dylan Horrocks with the "War Games" event when he and Grayson objected to Stephanie Brown being brutally murdered and DC taking away Babs from the comic too). Or you got nasty pricks in editing to deal with like Eddie Berganza (a noted DiDio toadie). It was just a toxic culture altogether, and I'm glad it is over when DiDio got fired in early 2020.

Two have left comics altogether (Puckett & Gabrych) and Horrocks is doing indie comic work in his native New Zealand, but avoiding the Big 2 after the "War Games" experience.

The sad truth is, if you write a Batgirl ongoing there's a 75% chance you're gonna get out of the industry. Literally, there's only a handful of Batgirl writers who've done stories on the ongoings and not left.

We just got Bryan Q. Miller back to DC in a few months (they're also reprinting the Batgirl Vol. 3 run he did), and that's probably cause most of the old regime left (see an SDCC 2020 Batgirls panel he was on with Sarah Kuhn and others where he goes onto a tale regarding his clashes with the heads over Cass).

Puckett did do a new foreword to his Batman Adventures run which got an Omnibus recently. So MAYBE there's hope for him too.

I hope I answered your question to the fullest on why Batgirl Vol. 1 ended and why Gabrych left the industry.

[ca-suffit]

Sorry, can I argue with the anon who said people are realising the show is shifting away "from the brown/black characters"?

First of all, there is a big fucking distinction between being Black and being a non-Black Person of Color. (Keep trying to elucidate this more but it just gets more inflammatory everytime I try. Sorry this the best I can do without calling people names 🤍)

Second of all, there is no point at which a Person of Color (Black or not) has been featured "enough" in promo or otherwise. I gotta get this out of the way. There is never "enough" promo for BIPoC. It could always be more and better. Armand was featured prominently prior to the season airing and he is at the SDCC panel. I do think AMC's marketing dept is undoubtedly being racist (left a MoC out of Mayfair Witches' promo too apparently). AMC needs to deal with that. We need to be on their asses about that. But don't play on Black fans (valid! Happened with Sleepy Hollow and countless others!) fears of this show sidelining US who BUILT this fucking show bcuz YOUR non-Black fave isn't getting his flowers! Especially when I know a lot of y'all weren't tuning the fuck in before the non-Black man had his moment in 2x05!!

And finally. Crucially. This is not a "brown" show. Even in that anon they put brown before Black. Ijbol. It's a Black show. With a Black lead. I'm sorry, this is not the time for participation trophies. Mind you, all day for weeks now Assadmand stans have been downplaying Jacob Anderson and Delainey Hayles ("I started watching for Armand!" "Armand was co-lead!" "This was Armand's szn!" etc EYE noticed 🫵🏿 that) while dutifully ignoring Armand's canon anti-Blackness (straight out of the Lestan Playbook ain't that curious) AND getting up Black Lescels asses for daring to like the wrong non-Black man better. Don't even get me started on cozying up to racist book fans for Devil's Minion tea. So let's not play racial solidarity games now cuz it has not been a fucking two way street. You can and should complain about AMC's racist marketing!! But do not turn around and try bring anti-Blackness into it bcuz who was featured just as heavily as always in promo? Louis and Claudia. And who do Assadmands constantly sweep under the rug unless they're shitting on Loustaters bcuz of Second Lead Syndrome? Claudia. How about the show, in this very szn, deconstructed the ideas of both the mythical anti-racist Europe and Black ppl being safer from anti-Blackness around non-Black PoC than white people? But here they are acting like the show isn't just going to be less racial in the future but has already gotten less racial... I wonder why 🤔

Anyway all the fucking doomposting after the finale... I know what they are doing. And I know why they bury the lede on this by making it about "brown/black" people in the show instead of just saying this is another racist failure of the famously inept marketing dept. Acting like the book fans talking abt how the show is awful and a flop and it's gonna get cancelled bcuz their fave non-Black man isn't the exclusive center of the universe.

Get real. Don't piss on my leg and tell me it's raining. - 🦁

.

[iww-gnv]

San Diego Comic-Con is going to look pretty different this year, as SAG-AFTRA has officially begun its strike. As the actors join the writers on the picket lines for better pay, conditions, and benefits, much of the industry has come to a halt without many of its key people. With the SAG-AFTRA strike now happening, it means actors cannot promote their current or future projects – including anything that was originally planned for Comic-Con. Thus, panels are already being cancelled for the event happening next week.

[hmslusitania]

I thought that other ask you got was phrased sort of weirdly when they said “American and SAG” and so I’d like to clarify: you don’t have to be American to be part of SAG, or WGA for that matter. You just have to have worked on American productions. For example, the SDCC panel for Good Omens S2 is effectively cancelled because not only is Neil Gaiman a WGA member, but David Tennant, Michael Sheen, and Miranda Richardson (and Jon Hamm but that seems obvious) are SAG members and they are therefore not allowed to promote the show. Good Omens S2 was filmed entirely in Scotland with (mostly) British actors, but it is still very much affected.

Obviously, an actor who has never worked in the US before will not be on strike. But plenty of British actors come over here to work on American shows, and are part of SAG, and are therefore on strike. It won’t impact the BBC as much as it will American companies, but I would be very surprised if it was completely without impact. I think the best way to know if it’s going to impact your fave British show is to look up whether any of the actors have been in American shows before, including anything on streaming services. (e.g., Shadow and Bone is filmed in Budapest but it’s still technically an American production because it’s Netflix, and that’s why the writers of the show are picketing.)

Oof, this got long, sorry about that! Just wanted to give more information as I’ve been following the strikes closely as someone with a lot of interest in the industry!

.

[samlestatreid]

I just want to scream and cry! SDCC just announced that the IWTV panel has been canceled due to the SAG-AFTRA strike!

[cbrownjc]

Interview with the Vampire will no longer be at SDCC 2023

You can read about it here:

https://sdccblog.com/2023/07/cancelled-panels-signings-for-san-diego-comic-con-2023/

The panel has been cancelled, due to the SAG Strike. Lots of other panels as well.

[my-mt-heart]

So if they're pushing the premier date back to August or September...why do anything at Tribeca? Why not SDCC? It just seems way too early to do something like a panel and show the first episode. The whole thing will be on the internet by the time TBOC airs. And then they're gonna go hard on promo from June until it airs? You gotta build off the hype. If it was SDCC, then they could feed off the energy to promote TBOC. I'm just surprised they haven't cancelled at Tribeca...

I assume they’d do an SDCC panel regardless of whether or not they’re pushing TBOC to fall (we don’t know if that’s the case yet, but I don’t see room for it earlier and there’s been absolutely no promo). The point of Tribeca or any similar event is to hype the core audience and get the GA/new viewers interested. 201 spoilers will be all over the place, yeah, and that could easily backfire if the episode doesn’t live up to the core audience i.e. Daryl and Carol fans’ standards which are clearly laid out in the replies to Valhalla’s tweet about it. So...I hope it's a good premiere🤷🏻‍♀️

[thowawayuntilfurthernotice]

To be fair, are any other shows on Prime getting a full panel? I assume Prime just lumps all their shows together. It would be one thing if Hazbin was lumped with other shows on the highlights reel just because all Prime shows are put together, but are there any Prime shows at all that are new and have their own panel?

Seeing as SAG is still on strike, all the live action series panels are either cancelled, or don’t feature any actors.

The Boys had a panel at NYCC back in 2019, and Good Omens had a panel at last year’s NYCC.

Even if SAG weren’t striking, I doubt Amazon would give Hazbin its own panel, seeing as it’s an animated series, and most network executives don’t value animation as a medium.

Though Invincible did get a season 2 trailer at SDCC, but that panel was centered around the 20th anniversary of the comic, rather than the TV show.

[avatar-news]

Avatar at SDCC 2023

Here’s your rundown of the Avatar franchise’s presence at San Diego Comic-Con this year:

👉 [CANCELLED] Avatar: Braving the Elements—Live! on Thursday July 20th at 1pm!

The Braving the Elements panel this year has been ***cancelled*** last minute due to the SAG-AFTRA strike meaning that hosts Janet Varney (the voice of Korra) and Dante Basco (the voice of Zuko) aren’t attending SDCC.

This is the panel that Avatar Studios revealed their first animated movie, the adult Team Avatar one, at last year; we don’t know what would have been revealed, if anything, this year.

It’s possible the soundtrack that was just announced today completely out of the blue was supposed to be revealed at this panel.

👉 Water, Earth, Fire, Air: Continuing the Avatar Legacy on Saturday, July 22nd at 12:30pm!

This year’s publishing panel is still on. This is where we could get news on novels, comics, etc.

This is the panel that the Azula in the Spirit Temple solo graphic novel was announced at last year, as well as the new Korra comic trilogy/trio, the first of which is supposed to be focused on Mako. This SDCC, we’re hoping that Mako comic is fully revealed, as well as maybe preview pages for Azula, and an even longer shot would be finding out who the next ATLA and/or TLOK comics will be about (Azula/Mai/Ty Lee; Mako/Bolin/Asami??)

It’s also possible with The Legacy of Yangchen just having coming out this week that the next Chronicles of the Avatar novel will be announced, revealing which Avatar the next books will be about, but they haven’t previously had news at comic cons so it’s not a sure deal.

👉 Mattel ATLA collector set

Mattel is releasing an Avatar: The Last Airbender collector set on the Barbie movie’s release date this Friday!

It will be available at the Mattel Creations booth, check out more info here.

👉 The Legacy of Yangchen exclusive edition

An exclusive edition of The Legacy of Yangchen is available at booth 1216!

That’s it as far as I know. It’s a pretty low-key SDCC this year across the industry due to the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. For Avatar, keep an eye out for potential publishing news and don’t have any expectations beyond that.

[xxgothchatonxx]

We got our first look (aside from that gorgeous poster) of Delainey Hayles as Claudia!

Very excited to see what she brings to the role. I’m guessing we’ll see more duality of her playing the innocent child act, and then switching to "I am done enduring”. I’m sure she’ll be great, either way.

It’s a real shame about the SDCC panel being cancelled (but I do still support the decision, and support the strikes) but I hope Delainey can see or at least know about all the support and good reception she’s getting so far.

[nalyra-dreaming]

Hello there, Nalrya 😊 Don't get me wrong, I'm fucking happy we are finally getting some content but if I'm not wrong part of the strike is not having any kind of promotion, including on social media, so why the s2 teaser is going to be released? Maybe AMC members of the WGA/SAG-AFTRA did not allowed it on events like SDCC but gave it the green light for social media? 🤔 I'm not from the US so I don't know much about how the unions work there, I try to learn as much as I can about the strike by youtube videos, articles and posts here on tumblr 😅

Hey!

If I understand it correctly the ones affected by strike cannot promote the show in any kind of way, yes.

However, the DGA managed to ratify its new contract at the end of June, contrary to the SAG and WGA. Which is why it’s likely no coincidence that the teaser news comes from Levan ;))

The panel etc was canceled, and the filming stopped, because 6 main cast members are part of SAG…

But AMC likely had this teaser prepared for SDCC already anyways, this is an important event after all and with the Street of Immortality an integral part of their promotion.

So I personally wouldn’t worry too much about ithe teaser breaking anything… 💕

[ingravinoveritas]

So I have question and I thought maybe you would have insights. I'm not British or American, so maybe things work differently than I understand. Michael's new drama on BBC Best Interests had started this week. I was surprised there was no interview with Michael about it from what I've seen. Usually when a TV show go on air there are at least some articles or talk shows with the main actors, so why he is so silent? He also didn't post anything about it or good omens s2, which also made me a bit worried. I know he's directing a series now but I expected he would at least post something about them. I don't want to be pessimistic but I'm preparing myself for a letdown with GO s2 promoting. Neil already said something about the fact that second seasons don't get the same level of events if I remember correctly, and he wouldn't be able to promote it due to the strike, and I was really excited about all the new Michael and David content we will get but what if there will be nothing almost? Is it a possibility? If best interests isn't being promoted by him maybe GO will not be promoted too? That will break my heart a little.

(Also I saw one episode of BI and I thought it was interesting, moving and Michael and the actor who played his wife were incredible. It is such a different character for him, his range is truelly incredible).

Hello, Anon! Again, apologies for being a bit delayed in answering this, but I appreciate you writing in to me.

So yes, Michael's show Best Interests did air a few weeks ago (I've seen almost all of the episodes and am hoping to write a review of it as I make my way through all my Anons). I can tell you that he actually did do some interviews for it--this one here in the Guardian, and this one in the Telegraph, and there might have been others that I've missed, though @invisibleicewands would probably know for sure.

I think there are a couple of things that happened with these interviews, which is that any promotion to BI unfortunately got overshadowed by the clickbait headline on the Telegraph article that ultimately led to a few clashes on Twitter between Michael and Laurence Fox (Billie Piper's ex, of all people?) about Michael's comments related to non-Welsh actors playing Welsh roles. So that, along with Michael continuously working on The Way (the series he was directing) nonstop is what I think kept him off of social media up until now.

(I will say, though, that it is curiously worth noting that Michael didn't do any kind of promotion for Staged 3, and all of that seemed to fall to Georgia and AL to repeatedly post about on their socials instead...)

As for GO 2, yes, it is true that the Writers' strike and possible impending SAG strike have thrown multiple wrenches into the proceedings (for instance, the GO 2 panel that was to have taken place at SDCC has been cancelled, as has the signing that was scheduled there). But there have already been snippets from an interview with Michael and David in SFX magazine floating around (along with another article in Radio Times that has invoked the ire of much of the fandom). Also, with any luck, you've been on Twitter today, because our Michael seems to have returned to form with a vengeance. His header photo is now one of the GO 2 photos of Aziraphale and Crowley:

And he's been tweeting up a gloriously chaotic storm this evening, after months and months of silence (and probably being locked up in Neil's basement):

My guess is that whatever kept Michael from talking before now--probably an NDA, per the contract he signed for the second season--has expired, and now he's coming out swinging. I've previously talked about the kinds of things Michael tweeted when the first season came out, but if you weren't here for that, it was basically a level of feral that he seemed to strive to surpass with every successive tweet. Given how much has happened since then, I think we are in for fandom-breaking tweets the likes of which probably go far beyond what any of us have imagined.

And--perhaps best of all--we do have one confirmed talk show appearance with Michael and David, on the One Show on BBC 2 tomorrow! (I've gotten an intriguing Anon about that as well, which I will be answering shortly.) So take heart, Anon, for all is undoubtedly not lost. It's likely that these interviews were planned well in advance, which means there could also be more interviews still to come. This press tour may not have the breadth and scope of the first season, but if Michael and David together, it's more than guaranteed to be something special.

I hope this has lifted your spirits some, Anon. Thank you for writing in! xx