Bionic Woman

The Los Angeles Times suggests the Bionic Woman writers use their time on the picket lines to rethink some of the more annoying aspects of the show, and come back with more action and less Becca.

Berkut Group prez and actor Miguel Ferrar was all over the gossip blogs this weekend, after his cousin George Clooney mentioned him in an upcoming W magazine interview.  George revealed that Miguel was the man who taught him about prostitutes, but the story is not quite as scandalous as it sounds.  Apparently the two were driving around L.A. in a Porsche shortly after young George came to town … "We pulled up at the stoplight, and all of these girls came over, and they were like, ‘Hey, do you want to party?’ I looked at Miguel and I said, ‘Chicks love me, man! I’m on fire here!’"  Miguel is also the source of a recent OK! magazine story reiterating Clooney’s vow to never marry again. 

Someone else to add to the list of people who think that casting Isaiah Washington was a mistake:  Steve McPherson, the head of ABC, was recently quoted in the New York Times as saying network exec Ben Silverman was “clueless or stupid” in the way he negotiated to bring IW to BW.

A lot of bloggers have been laughing about the iPhone scene in The List, as it seems guest star Callum Keith Rennie was holding the phone upside down for at least half of the scene where he is threatening to kill Tom while negotiating the price of his life with Jaime.  Some of them wonder if the error was on purpose, given NBC’s well-documented dispute with Apple.

Michelle Ryan has gotten some press recently for expressing a desire to break into movies, which she may be able to do sooner rather than later depending on what happens with the strike.

Rounding out the third Jaime and Nathan scene from, episode 1.05, “The Education of Jaime Sommers,” this clip is fun because it shows Jaime figuring out how to break into the office of the professor she has gone undercover to investigate.  Her goal is to break in the place and scan his computer to get proof he is selling his mind controlling computer chip to terrorists.

Jaime and Nathan’s scenes are some of my favorites because Kevin Rankin has turned out to be a fun, likeable character.  Unfortunately, we don’t know too much about his character Nathan, other than he is the go to guy for Jaime all things bionic.  He mends her when something breaks, watches her while she is undercover and here, assists as she figures out how to get in the office.

Also, note Michelle Ryan uses her British accent and she does sound, as Nathan says, “It is literally the hottest thing ever.”

I hope there is more of Nathan as the season goes on and we finally get to see more of him.

Favorite Line:

Nathan:  So typical of this place, they spend $50 million dollars on you and won’t spring for Bluetooth.

Continuing the highlights of Jaime and Nathan scenes from Bionic Woman, episode 1.05, “The Education of Jaime Sommers,” this scene finds Jaime already on assignment undercover as a British transfer student working to find out if a world renewed professor in Parkinson’s research is selling his research to terrorists.  The professor has a teaching assistant, this week’s extra special guest star, Jordan Bridges.  Turns out, Bridges plays “Tom” the CIA agent, also on assignment to learn who is selling the professor’s mind controlling chips.

Jaime has become quite enamored with the teacher’s assistant.    Unbeknownst that the other is a spy, Jaime and Tom hit it off and start to become more than “student” and “teacher”.

Poor Nathan, he has to sit back at Berkut HQ and watch through Jaime’s ocular camera as Tom smoothly seduces Jaime.  It’s fun watching Nathan get jealous as Tom’s smooth style obviously has a romantic effect on Jaime.

Favorite Line: 

Nathan:  Chatty Kathy, cut the cord.

It’s no secret around these parts that I really like the interaction and chemistry Michelle Ryan as Jaime Sommers and Kevin Rankin as Nathan have each episode.  In fact, I think these actors have the best chemistry on the show, and the producers haven’t even bothered to give Nathan a last name!

Here’s one of three, count ‘em three clips of Jaime and Nathan from episode 1.05, “The Education of Jaime Sommers”.

The set up:

Jaime is going undercover as college student transferring in for the semester to study neurobiology under a world renewed professor suspected of selling his brain chip research to the highest bidder. 

Jaime feels completely overwhelmed because a) she didn’t actually go to Harvard and b) had she gone, her major was going to be Irish literature.

Poor Nathan, the more time he spends with Jaime, the more he realizes they aren’t such a perfect match.

Favorite line:

Nathan:  Wow, we have very little in common.

Here’s an interesting podcast comprised of most of the cast and crew of Bionic Woman.  I’m not sure when this was created, as it is an “infomercial” for the show incorporating many different interviews and show clips into a thirty minute podcast. 

Nothing is new here, except Chris Bowers, aka Will Anthros, is included in this production.  Again, is Will Anthros alive?  Although we saw his funeral at the beginning of episode 1.02, I have speculated for weeks, that killing him didn’t make much sense.  However, with so many cast and crew changes, who knows.

Listen to the podcast and then come back and offer your thoughts in comments.

The things you find on YouTube really are amazing.  Take this movie trailer for a British comedy, I Want Candy, co-starring the bionic woman herself, Michelle Ryan.  Via the official website, I Want Candy is about:

Two hopeful Lads From Leatherhead trying to break into the movies who stumble upon the opportunity of a lifetime. Making a ground breaking graduation film, complete with scenes of an Adult nature, in their parents house is never going to be easy but dreams have a funny way of working out.

Carmen Electra is Candy Fiveways, the #1 porn star in the world and the star of the two lead’s graduation film. 

It looks like it opened in the UK early this year, but I don’t remember seeing anything about it here.  Carmen Electra is pretty, but not much of an actress.  The film looks pretty silly.  The reviews at IMDB are mild at best.

Has anyone seen this movie?

Michelle Ryan chatted recently with Hollywood.com reporter Scott Huver.  Nothing new is learned about her really or at least nothing we haven’t already learned before. 

On whether it’s Jaime’s hardware or software that’s most appealing:
“It’s absolutely the human side. I mean I haven’t read a script like Bionic Woman. After I left [the British soap] EastEnders, I was like, “I’m never going to try out for anything with huge [time] options.” And then I read this script for Bionic and I was like “Okay, I take it back.” She has these deeper abilities, but at the core of it, it’s this young woman’s journey of self-discovery and her rise to empowerment, and I feel like I’m on that journey and I just felt like an instant connection. She’s very compassionate and she questions every step of the way when Jonas and Antonio Pope are saying to her, “This is what we should be doing; we’re the good guys.” She questions everything. And I love that she’s just this very grounded, multi-layered character and person. There’s so much to play with her, aside from the action sequences and the sci-fi element. At the core of it, it’s this human being. I wanted to find my voice and I want to be strong and confident and I feel like playing Jaime is helping me get there.”

On maintaining that state-of-the-art operating system:
“I work out probably about three and a half hours a day, I would say. It’s two hours of personal training and two hours of [Israeli martial art] Krav Maga, like an hour and a half of personal training. if I didn’t have to work out I wouldn’t do it. I mean, I used to dance and swim and do gymnastics, but this really has gotten me into shape. I’m getting abs and my muscles are getting bigger. I’m also being much more conscious of what I’m eating. I’m just trying to eat a lot more like sushi and fish and fruit and vegetables. I’m cutting out sweets–I’ve got such a sweet tooth, especially chocolate!”

However, there is one exception and it makes me wonder when this interview took place.  When asked about Jaime Sommers future and the character’s relationships, Ryan mentions the relationship with Will Anthros. 

“I think there are a lot of different ideas for love triangles, and there’s obviously the relationship with Will. I mean, she’s a woman and so all of those feelings and emotions and hormones will come up. I think that initially though it’ll be dealing with becoming bionic and understanding her abilities, but absolutely down the line she’s got to have some romance.”

Is Anthros really dead?  Is Chris Bowers still part of the  show?

Bionic Woman episode 1.04, “Face Off,” had one cool action sequence that is fun to watch.  There is one at the beginning of the episode but this one is better.

The set up:

Michelle Ryan as Jaime Sommers and Isaiah Washington as Antonio Pope have flown to Paraguay to rescue from terrorists a CIA agent in possession of proprietary Berkut Group data on bionics.  After escaping from their captors, Sommers and Pope disagree how to handle the CIA agent (Pope wants to kill him) and she and the agent ditch Pope and make their escape out of the warehouse.  However, Sommers is outflanked by the terrorists and her only way to reach their exit point is to leap across the warehouse using ductwork as “stepping stones”.  It really is a fantastic scene.  See if you can hear the subtle use of bionic sound effects.  I personally wish there were more.

If you like the stunt, the a link to the filming of the stunt is after the jump.

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The beautiful Bionic Woman herself, Michelle Ryan, recently landed on the cover of TV Guide.  The staff at TV Guide were kind smart enough to film the photo shoot with Ryan and the rest of the cast and make it available for us all to watch.  It includes interviews with Michelle Ryan, Katee Sackhoff and several cast members.  Most telling is a clip of actor Chris Bowers, a.k.a., the supposedly deceased fiance Will Anthros.  There has been much speculation that Will really isn’t dead and I think including Bowers in the photo shoot lends credence to the theory.

The most fun is Katee Sackhoff talking about her love for the outdoors and her ability to gut her of fish.

Enjoy.

Did anyone catch the magazine Sarah Corvus was reading just before a cool fight scene broke out?

It looks like Bio Magazine.  Any guesses?

Tonight’s episode, “Faceoff” looks even more fun than last week’s episode because the action sequence looks bigger and better.  Also, Michelle Ryan’s Jaime Sommers look like she will duke it out with Isaiah Washington’s Antonio Pope.  Episode 1.03 had a brief sparring scene between the two, but also produced the worst line of the series thus far.

Remember, Bionic Woman airs on NBC Wednesdays at 8/9 CST.

Michelle Ryan continues her delayed media tour promoting Bionic Woman this week and it wouldn’t be complete without an appearance on The View. 

Michelle Ryan comes across as very sweet and charming and watching her “live” this week has made me appreciate what a great actress she is.  Barbara Walters has her go from a British accent to an American one and she does it without blinking.  She is also so unassuming and polite, that I wish Ryan had been promoting BW before it premiered and that I could have gotten to see her as herself before seeing her as Jaime Sommers.

Joy Behar asks her about Washington and if he has caused any trouble on the set.  Ryan deftly sidesteps the question and jokes about his age compared to hers.

Nothing new learned from the interview for me other than she was cast as Jaime Sommers while filming a movie with Faye Dunaway and she trains for the fight scenes  practicing the Israel self defense of Krav Maga.

I look forward to seeing her do more interviews and learning more about her.

Michelle Ryan stopped by the Today show Monday to promote Bionic Woman.  This is my first live interview with Ryan and she really pulled it off for me.  Meaning she didn’t come across as stupid, vapid or anything other than charming. 

One point of interest is her accent.  As is the case with House actor Hugh Laurie, Ryan’s British accent is very pronounced.  However, I have never picked up even a hint of her UK roots while watching BW.  Comparing her Jaime Sommers’ voice to her everyday voice, it doesn’t sound like the same woman.  She says accents for her come very easily and it isn’t that much of a challenge for her. 

Not too much is revealed about the actress.  She is 23, does not wish to be bionic and hasn’t gotten caught up in the United States hype of the new show because it is filmed in Vancouver.  She barely remembers the original BW and has only seen a couple of episodes.  She is a big fan of Alias and reveals an embarrassing incident meeting Jennifer Garner in an elevator and being so nervous that she got off on the wrong floor. Pretty much the same story she discussed in her TV Guide interview.

The interview does include a clip of an upcoming episode with Ryan fighting bad guys while Katee Sackhoff as Sarah Corvus watches idly.  Fun stuff.

I am glad to see Ryan finally making media appearances as she had been MIA for the first couple of weeks leading up to the show.

Check it out and let me know what you think about her accent.

Don’t forget the new issue of TV Guide hits the stands today, with Michelle Ryan and Bionic Woman on the cover! Michelle talks about being star struck by Jennifer Garner, and all of the focus on the show, in the magazine’s article.

Bionic Woman premiered in Australia last night, complete with a flurry of publicity for the show down under.

Want to buy a thirty second spot on Bionic Woman? According to MediaWeek the show is NBC’s most expensive new offering, with rates of $185,000 a spot.

SFGate.com is not happy with Bionic Woman’s faux San Francisco setting, noting that the show “does not even try” to look like the location where Jaime & Co. supposedly work, live, play, and fight.

Based on the comments on TVSquad, a lot of people are just as upset as Ryan about the idea of Isaiah Washington claiming he may get a Bionic Woman spin off … especially since he said it before his character was even on the air. Remote Access is also interested in Isaiah’s comments about how the government sees Jaime as a military weapons property.

Michelle Ryan talks with FitSugar.com about her workout routine, and A Socialite’s Life has pictures of her working out. She also speaks with The Scanner about how she would not like to be bionic or have a mind-reading bionic boyfriend in her own life.

Ryan wrote about how he thought Katee Sackhoff should not be smoking on Bionic Woman, and apparently she agrees because this weekend she told some guests at the Sacramento Comic-Con that she has asked the producers to air some anti-smoking public service announcements during the show.

Katee fans are also thrilled about her role in Halo 3, including lines in the game that sound suspiciously like lines from her Battlestar Galactica character Kara “Starbuck” Thrace. If you are a Katee Sackhoff fan, be sure to vote for her as “Best Female Action Star” in the poll that is up over at Slice of SciFi.com. Claudia Black from Farscape and Stargate SG-1 and Summer Glau from Firefly and Serenity are in the lead right now, followed closely by Amanda Tapping from Stargate: SG1 and Stargate: Atlantis.

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Michelle Ryan is having an amazing week.  The premiere episode of Bionic Woman beat Private Practice in the line up head-to-head and she lands the cover of TV Guide for the week of October 8-14.  The issue hits newsstands October 4 and will hopefully contain many bionic tidbits.  

I love the photograph and can’t wait to read their bionic “exclusive”.

Enjoy!