Bionic Woman

Entertainment Weekly has an four-page feature on blonde action heroine and former bionic babe Katee Sackhoff in this week’s issue, where the star talks about her roles on Bionic Woman and Battlestar Galactica as well as her plans for the future.

Among the more interesting revelations for Bionic Woman fans was Katee’s frustration about how watered down Sarah Corvus became as the show got more and more attention.

“She was sooooo much crazier than what ended up on the air,” said the actress.  “She kept being pulled back.  That’s the norm for network television, as far as I am concerned.”

It’s another insider comment about the stunted potential of what could have been a great show, and one that is especially intriguing considering the Sarah Corvus scenes that made it on the air were pretty crazy.  The Sarah we saw was needy, violent, homicidal, caring, self-destructive, palpably alive and yet slipping into psychosis while dying. 

What Sarah Corvus could have been, or would have been, if Sackhoff had been allowed to truly unleash her man-eating and scene-chewing glory will be a mystery for the ages.  As will the question of who she was with in the pilot, and what would have become of her complicated relationship with the elder Anthros played by Mark Sheppard.

The article also contained high praise for Katee from Bionic and Battlestar executive producer David Eick:  “You’ll see I tend to cast Katee in everything I possibly can … She’s a very special find.  Those actors who can combine the qualities of strength and vulnerability - they usually call those people movie stars.”

The magazine interview featured some gorgeous pictures of Katee looking fiercely lovely with flowing blonde extensions.  There are also videos of Katee from the shoot on the magazine’s web site for those who are interested.

The models of Deal or No Deal channeled their inner Bionic Women, performing their own version of Michelle Ryan and Katee Sackhoff’s famous rainy rooftop fight scene.  In a remarkable show of concentration, the models never slipped in their heels and never dropped the signature Deal or No Deal numbered cases.

The dialogue from the clip is word for word the dialogue from the Bionic Woman premiere, starting from Katee’s “Stop, Time Out” and going through the moment where Michelle completes the fight still standing.  While the models slap fight instead of hard punch, and they keep both feet on the ground instead of flying through the air on harnesses, it is still an entertaining spoof of the show.

It’s also a reminder of what the show could have been, as everything related to Bionic Woman tends to be.  Even with all of its flaws, the pilot still presented interested characters and a fascinating premise in the form of the frenemy relationship between Jaime Sommers and Sarah Corvus.

The two of them had the potential to embody the phrase “What does not kill you makes you stronger,” while the show could have explored some of the more intriguing and disturbing questions of our time.  The role of government subcontractors with blanket powers, the mystery of what is more powerful in the potential war between metaphysics or physics, the ongoing culture wars over what makes a “perfect woman” … Bionic Woman could have explored these questions, and many more.

But as I wrote the other day, that is what killed the show.  EVERYBODY saw the potential of Bionic Woman, but they all had a different idea of what the show should do to live up to their unique views and expectations.  And a show that tries to please everyone, like a person that tries to please everyone, is doomed to failure and will never please very many people at all.

The modern Jaime Sommers will not be back … not for a while anyway.  For all of her potential, for all of her strength, she could not survive the tough challenges of the modern television industry.

Much like in the show, what got the modern Jaime into the most trouble was listening to too many people.  The new Jaime did not know who she was, and was more than willing to listen to people tell her who she needed to be … for all her defiant slouching in the tunnels of the Burket Group, the modern Jaime was absorbing everyone’s expectations for what kind of Bionic Woman she should become. 

And that turned out to be the disease that finally killed the modern Bionic Woman, that desperate need to change to please everybody.  Because everybody thought they knew what she needed to do to succeed. 

As a result the modern Bionic Woman was a constantly changing mess.  People were always opening her up, rearranging her bionic parts, removing characters, adding plotlines, and then removing them again just as quickly.  If the machine is nothing without the woman, then the Woman needed some spine and some structure … but just like no one at the Berkut Group thought to give Jaime a good cell phone, no one recognized the obvious until it was too late to save her modern life. 

From the very first reviews of the pilot to things still being written today, the majority of people who saw the show thought they could make Bionic Woman better, faster, stronger than what they were seeing on screen.  

From NBC Entertainment President Ben Silverman to fans of the original series, from actual bionic scientists to television bloggers … pretty much every person who saw the show had the same thought as Bionic Woman scholar Herbie J. Pilato:   “David Eick needs to call me.”

“I mean, I know what went wrong,” Bionic star Katee Sackhoff said in a recent interview.  “Had they given me the show, I could have figured it out. I could have told them exactly what to do. But then everyone would have put their hands in, and the same thing would have happened … that’s just how it goes.”

By trying to please everyone, the Bionic Woman ended up pleasing no one at all.  By allowing everyone to mess with her, she gave away everything she was and became nothing.

A post on the NBC.com message boards reports that a scam artist is taking advantage of fans’ sorrow over Bionic Woman’s cancellation to scam money by pretending to be Michelle Ryan’s agent.

The man contacts fans through message boards and e-mail and claims Michelle has a bank account that she would like them to contribute to, which she will then use to donate to the charity of her choice.  The scam is obviously fake, and hopefully no unwitting fans fell for this ploy, especially since the man is asking for contributions of two thousand dollars and up.

As the poster reported:

“This a Man is a fake..michelle’s agent is a Woman (i think) and i ask this guy why is the account in his name shouldn’t it be in michelle’s name or the charity the she is supporting?..I didn’t hear back from him after that..so be warned..”

The poster later reported she had alerted Michelle’s real agent of the scam, and her legal team was looking into the issue.  Let’s hope the fan also included the accompanying electronic data, and some e-detectives are in the process of tracking down this tacky trickster.

It’s been a rough week for Michelle, as fans hopes for a Bionic rebirth were further dashed by David Eick’s openness about the show’s impending official cancellation. 

On the bright side, Bionic Woman continued to be a ratings sensation in her home country of the United Kingdom.  After setting records for ITV2 during its premiere, Bionic Woman continued to do well on the channel during its second week.  Also, the news of Heather Mills’ dramatic final divorce hearing, where she dumped water on the attorney of former husband Paul McCartney, gave the British tabloids another beauty to bash for awhile.

It has been a long journey for WatchingBionicWoman, and while the hours of labor I put into this blog are nothing compared to how hard the cast and crew worked on the show it was still a huge disappointment to read last week’s announcement from David Eick.  I will post my thoughts on the cancellation news soon, but in the interim be sure to check out the Top Ten Things That Hurt Bionic Woman list and check out the news as it arrives.

Molly Price’s new movie, The Life Before Her Eyes, will premiere April 18 in the United States.  Molly plays Uma Thurman’s mother in the film, which surrounds the secret life of Uma’s character as she comes to terms with her guilt about a violent incident in her past.  Evan Rachel Wood plays Uma’s character as a young girl and you can see a glimpse of Molly in the movie’s trailer, which is below.

Word is that David Eick is refreshingly candid on his DVD commentary during the first episode of Bionic Woman, stating the show was “the most difficult production ever.”

Katee Sackhoff hit the road during the writer’s strike, taking her Harley out for a spin around some wineries with her Battlestar Galactica costar Tricia Helfer (”Number Six”).

Miguel Ferrer is mentioned as a possible link in the new game “Six Degrees of David Duchovny,” which could be the new “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.”

Will Yun Lee apparently turned 37 this weekend … I never would have guessed he was a day over 30!  Happy Birthday Will, and may you land many great roles in the year to come.

Executive Producer David Eick broke ranks with NBC Universal last week, telling the press that Bionic Woman really is over even as the network has stood by its claim that no official decision has been made about the future of the series.

“I just felt that the process was so frustrating, and the conditions under which we were making that show never really came to fruition in such a way that I felt like we could make the show well. The actress [Michelle Ryan] we found was wonderful. Some of the writing was good.

“We just didn’t ever bring it all together like we did with Battlestar,” he continued. “At a certain point, when it becomes that frustrating, I think you’re better off to say, ‘Let’s try again another time,’ and let it go.”

SciFi Wire got the scoop at last week’s SciFi Channel upfronts, where Eick was promoting Battlestar Galactica and the upcoming prequel series Caprica. 

The Toronto Star had some additional commentary from show star Katee Sackhoff, who played Jaime Sommers’ frenemy Sarah Corvus:

“It’s no one’s fault,” Sackhoff told the paper. “The hype was so big before the show came out, and they were so scared that it would fail, that everyone had an opinion. There were too many cooks in the kitchen, and they didn’t know what they were cooking.

“I mean, I know what went wrong. Had they given me the show, I could have figured it out. I could have told them exactly what to do. But then everyone would have put their hands in, and the same thing would have happened. You can’t blame anyone. That’s just how it goes.”

Katee Sackhoff channeled her Kara “Starbuck” Thrace persona last night on The Late Show with David Letterman.  This is a photo of Katee outside the Ed Sullivan Theater, where she and nine other Battlestar Galactica cast members shot a BSG-themed Top Ten List. 

The next night Katee partied at the SciFi Channel upfronts party, promoting the fourth season of Battlestar Galactica and enjoying what may be the show’s last upfront party.  Check out the photo below.

Will Yun Lee’s short film The Seed will be showing tomorrow evening at the Boston Underground Film Festival.  For more information on this endeavor, and to watch the preview for the film, check out the previous post.

While the British press continues to be hostile towards Michelle Ryan, some bloggers in her home country have echoed the feeling in the States that Bionic Woman still has tremendous potential for success.  Take this post excerpt, for example:

“Bionic Woman 2007 has the potential to be an engrossing, action-packed romp – and having a political subtext really shouldn’t be an obstacle to that. Let’s just hope the big suits in the States reckon there is life in the show. With a few nips and tucks, it could be amazing.”

Speaking of “could be amazing,” this blog post inspired me to think about what Bionic Woman would have been like on another (less meddling) network.  NBC proved it could make scifi exciting again when Heroes took television by mutant storm in 2006, proved it could make anything boring in 2007 … I wonder what the network will do in 2008?

Will Yun Lee shifts from playing Jaime Sommers’ trainer on Bionic Woman to playing a disturbed man in the film The Seed:

“SUNG (Will Yun Lee) is a homeless veteran losing his mind on the banks of the L.A. River. Pursued by unseen forces, fighting unseen foes, Sung is ostensibly ‘just another lunatic.’ But as his invisible war continues, under bridges and in tunnels, we are taken deeper and deeper into Sung’s nightmare and mind.

“Into a nightmare of conspiracy, cloaking and the government’s unseen war. Sung struggles to fight through what is visible to him, yet invisible to the world around him. Ordinarily, someone like this is perceived as “crazy.” Beyond what we can see, beyond what we don’t want to, lies…THE SEED.”

The Seed is the film directorial debut of Joe Hahn, the turntablist/disc jockey for the popular band, Linkin Park.  Hahn has extensive experience directing music videos, but The Seed is his first short film. 

The Seed was shot in four days, and features Will in full fight scene mode.  The shoot was almost two years ago, but since it was a side project and not the director’s first love it has taken awhile for the film to be released. 

The film originally premiered at the Pusan International Film Festival last fall, and will be available on ITunes on March 24, 2008.  According to Rolling Stone, Hahn had always planned for The Seed to have an online release.

More information about the short film can be found on the band’s web site, or on the movie’s MySpace page.  You can also check out the second of three available “making of” clips below.

The first season of Bionic Woman is available on DVD today in the United States, just as the show is revving up in Michelle Ryan’s home market of the United Kingdom.

The DVD set includes all of the show’s episodes as well as a limited number of special features, including commentary from executive producer David Eick and a feature on real life bionics. There is also a stunt feature, which devoted fans have probably already seen on various promotional shows last fall, and some profiles of the actors.

The feature that everyone really wants seems to be absent. Imagine if this DVD set included the unaired second episode “Birds” and some information about why the original plots (and characters) were abandoned after the show’s premiere.

A television DVD set that dared to admit that “mistakes were made” and discuss them honestly is a rare sight on the modern media landscape, and even people who never watched the show are curious about what happened to Bionic Woman. What happened to Sarah Corvus, and her plea to Jaime to save her life? What happened to the plans of Jaime were stolen while she was in South America? Where did Anthony Anthros go? A DVD set that talked honestly about these Bionic mysteries would be a must-buy.

The list price for the DVD package is $29.99, but Amazon and other retail outlets have it on sale for $19.99 during the early days of the release. Katee Sackhoff fans can purchase season one of Bionic Woman and season three of Battlestar Galactica for a combined price of $58.98, a deal that includes free shipping.

Not sure how we missed this last fall, but Attack of the Show did a Bionic Woman parody featuring Olivia Munn called Lesbionic Woman. 

In the Munn version of the NBC drama, Jaime Sommers is a well groomed hottie who looks more like a debutante than a bartender.  Jaime gets hit by a car instead of a truck driven by a psycho, and and the giant scream reveal scene that was featured so prominently in the United States promos shows Jaime discovering she is now wearing combat boots and flannel. 

The Lesbionic Woman attacks a man with a rainbow flag, knees another one in the groin, and talks on the phone with an ear peice to her headquarters just like Michelle Ryan’s Jaime chatted with Kevin Rankin’s Nathan. 

All of this leads up to the video’s, um, climax, where Jaime stops a group of terrorists by stunning their blonde leader with an open mouth kiss.  It’s no coincidence that the blond leader looks a bit like Katee Sackhoff’s Sarah Corvus, and the gun wielding terrorists behind her look a bit like the nondescript, gun-heavy men in black who appeared in almost every episode of the show. 

In the final scene Olivia Munn’s Jaime discovers that her car alarm has hidden vibrator-esque benefits — a perk that Michelle Ryan’s Jaime definitely would have appreciated.  Overall it’s pretty funny, and the Attack of the Show clip even gets a thumbs up from the ladies over at LesbianGamers.com.

In stark contrast MadTV did a Lesbionic Woman skit as well, where Jaime’s character gets a mullet and joins a softball team. This version is not even remotely funny, grabbing on all of the negative stereotypes it can stuff into its thankfully short time and lacking the fun of the Attack of the Show sketch.  Still, if you like the idea of Jaime in a mullet rolling around on the grass with a Katee Sackhoff impersonator with frightening red lips, feel free to check it out.

Someone was kind enough to put the U.K. promos for Bionic Woman up on YouTube, and they are a treat. 

Combining some of the best moments of the first few episodes, the above promo features lots of butt-kicking by Michelle Ryan’s Jaime Sommers.  There are a few good one liners, an earnest plea from Miguel Ferrer’s Jonas Bledsoe and that is it … no Sarah Corvus, no Jae, no Becca.  And the promo is better for it.

The promo below is for the premiere, and watching it makes it clear why Bionic Woman pulled in ITV2’s biggest audience to date.  With lots of action sequences interspersed between scenes of Michelle with her hair blowing attractively yet menacingly in the wind, the promo did a better job than the show of explaining the intriguing concept of a woman forced to become a war machine against her will. 

Even better, this version of a premiere promo cut out the long and horrid scream that was featured so prominently in the United States’ teasers.  It’s a promo that really is better, faster, and stronger … and more suited for a show that was meant to be a fast paced look at the moral dilemmas associated with Jaime’s unique opportunity/horrific situation.

The promos make me long for what the show could have been, before the network meddled too much and the show went through three show runners in its first third of its first season.  Ah, Bionic Woman … we never got to see how strong you could become.

Bionic Woman’s premiere scored record ratings for ITV2 this week, as Michelle Ryan’s butt kicking babe helped the niche channel score the biggest audience of the channel’s history.  According to Variety, show gathered 2.2 million viewers, over six times the channel’s average (other sources are reporting numbers that are as high as 2.4 million viewers).

Bionic Woman started off strong in the United States as well, when over 13 million viewers tuned in for the premiere and made the show the most-watched new show of the fall in key demographics.  Then high turnover and last minute changes created shaky story lines and a lack of cohesion, and ratings suffered as the show stumbled around looking for a new direction.

Still, the huge increase in viewers for niche channel ITV2 is great news for Bionic Woman, as the British press has not been shy about reporting that BW has been canceled even when there is no official word from NBC.  For the show to pull the channel’s best audience in history, even as the full episode is available in various places on the Internet (such as hulu.com) is a huge accomplishment.

Bionic Woman beat the channel’s previous high, a showing of Footballer’s Wives: Extra Time in 2005 that was watched by 1.9 million viewers.  Footballer’s Wives was a swift-moving soap with scandalous storylines that generated a rabid following.  The show’s highest premiere before Bionic Woman was last year’s Diary of a Secret Call Girl which debuted 1.8 million viewers.  

ITV2 is a growing power in the U.K. television market, and a second home for many American shows looking to find an American audience.  The channel already shows popular U.S. niche fare such as Entourage and Supernatural, shows with small but strong audiences on their home channels that enjoy expanded audiences through the Internet and on DVD.

Bionic Woman star Kevin Rankin, who plays Nathan on the show, recently gave an interview in which he was asked about the plight of disappearing cultures in the modern world. 

Kevin stopped by a gifting even in Los Angeles in December, and while there agreed to answer a question about diminishing cultures.  The interviewer asked Kevin what he thought should be done, or not done, in order to help preserve cultures that are vanishing in the modern world. 

Kevin’s answer was fairly impressive considering that he did not seem prepared to speak about such a complicated topic that day, and the question was far more intricate than the fluff questions television actors typically get at swag events. He managed to connect the issue of globalization of commerce with people’s need to understand the cultures that made our world what it is today:

“Well, as far as preserving culture, once you start losing that foundation …  I mean everything we have today is because of the existing cultures before it.  You can’t have the branch without the tree underneath.  You start losing sight of the culture, of influences, you start to question why are we doing this again, the things we are doing today you don’t know what the reasons are, what the traditions came from, if you don’t know what the past was about. 

“And I think that, you know, enough with the globalization, we don’t need a McDonald’s on every corner, yeah it may create a job or two, but ultimately it make take away from the distinct taste of cultures that were there before us.”

The question was related to a film that will be released in 2008 called Hawaii: A Voice for Sovereignty.  The documentary was toasted in Los Angeles on February 29 at a green carpet gala that marked the film’s premiere.

Lucy Hale, who plays Becca Sommers on Bionic Woman, has been telling fans on her official web site that the show has definitely been canceled.  Meanwhile, NBC has apparently been communicating with fans and telling them that no official decision has been made to date.

False rumors about the cancellation of Bionic Woman have been swirling for months, and at this point so many people have reported that the show has been canceled that even many in the mainstream media believe it to be true. 

The reality is that no one connected with the show has made an on-the-record statement about its future, however, and there is officially still a chance the show could return in some form in the fall.  The show’s production offices are still open, according to local Vancouver newspaper the Globe & Mail, and the show’s episodes and information remain up on NBC.com even after other shows that have been canceled have been removed.

Last week, NBC Vice President Rebecca Marks apparently told a fan in an e-mail that no official decision has been made on the show:

“Thanks for your support on Bionic.  I think it is a great show too.  We are still determining its future.  We should know more in May.  Hang in there.”

Over on LucyHale.com, however, the actress is being very clear with fans that she has been told that the show will not be returning:

“My manager was notified by NBC that the show was being cancelled [sic].  There has been a lot of rumor about the show, but unfortunately it is definitely over.  I’m sad, but it was such a good experience for me.”

In response to one fan’s opinion that NBC failed the show with its constant meddling, Lucy posted:

“I was disapointed to learn about the ending of the show, of course,  but it is just how this business goes. Thank you for being concerned about the cast! We will be fine though.  I appreciate the support.”

Lucy’s posts definitely make it harder to keep hope alive for Bionic Woman.  While this blog will not report the show is canceled until it comes from the network, it is plausible that NBC is telling its stars one thing and the fans another. 

The reality is that NBC has a very strong motivation to delay an official cancellation announcement, as the show has yet to start airing in many overseas markets.  Michelle Ryan, the show’s star, is proving herself to be a mature professional by continuing to do cheerful publicity for the show in Great Britain in anticipation of Bionic Woman’s UK debut this week.

As with all things Bionic Woman, fans will continue to have to wait and see.

Michelle Ryan is grabbing headlines in the United Kingdom with some sexy photos she shot to promote the British premiere of Bionic Woman, which starts Tuesday across the pond.  To see the shots some newspapers have labeled “bionic bosoms” click here.

Bionic Woman is still alive and kicking, despite what you may hear from the press.  Everything I have heard is that the fate of the show is still undetermined, and that seems to be reinforced by NBC which has continued to feature the show on its web site, and communicate hope to its fans.  Word is the show will be “returning soon” or at least still has a chance to come back on the air in the fall — hopefully with a new and sturdier vision.

Of course, not everyone is a fan.  Lee Majors has a problem with the modern version of Bionic Woman, and Roco at Bionic Blog has a problem with that.  Roco lashes out at Lee’s criticisms in the show and states that Michelle Ryan could take the alter ego of The Six Million Dollar Man in a fight.  Roco may be right.

Miguel Ferrer is getting good reviews for his voice performance in the new animated movie Justice League: The New Frontier.  Miguel plays the Martian whose arrival on Earth is the catalyst for many of the events in the movie, which also stars the voices of Lucy Lawless, Kyra Sedgwick, Neil Patrick Harris, Kyle McLachlan, David Boreanaz, and Jeremy Sisto.  If you have seen the DVD let us know what you think.

One lucky fan got to get face to face with Michelle Ryan when she was on the red carpet in London for the Brit Awards.  Check out the quick clip of a harried Michelle saying “hi” below.