Bionic Woman

SciFi Pulse has an interesting interview with Michelle Ryan on the motivations and inspirations of Jamie Sommers, including her insights into the friendship and rivalry of Jamie and Katee Sackhoff’s Sarah Corvus. In other Michelle news, she also recently talked about why she did not research amputees before filming Bionic Woman.

BuddyTV has an interview with Crystal Lowe, who plays Jamie’s best friend on Bionic Woman.

Entertainment blog powerhouse Watch with Kristin has named Michelle Ryan and Jamie Sommers on their list of Newbies You Will Love. The flattering post even compares Michelle to Julie Andrews.

Ryan gave us Jonas Bledsoe’s official bio and Roco on Bionic-Blog has some interesting background information on the head of the group that implanted Jamie Sommers with her bionic parts.

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Migeul Ferrer as Jonas Bledsoe - Photo via NBC

We continue our character background on the main characters rounding out Jaime Sommers’ life. Today, the founder of the The Berkut Group, Jonas Bledsoe.

Jonas Bledsoe was born in Chicago, Illinois to Sean and Denise Bledsoe. Sean was a prominent trader on the Chicago Board of Trade until his death in 1954 of a massive coronary. Denise Bledsoe remained unmarried, raising Jonas alone in Winnetka, Illinois. Jonas started school at Crow Island elementary, going on to attend Washburn Middle School and New Trier High School where he graduated in the top ten percent of his class. During high school Bledsoe excelled at swimming, leading his team to the state championships. He was known for his sharp debating skills and during his final two years, he had a weekly morning radio program where he showcased the works of new jazz artists like Lonnie Smith, Les McCann and Bill Doggett.

After graduation, Bledsoe enrolled at West Point Military Academy. He graduated in 1975 and was stationed in Saudi Arabia. As the Lebanese Civil War escalated, Bledsoe was sent to Beirut as a military observer. Despite the official mandate, Bledsoe broke protocol in an ultimately doomed attempt to rescue civilians in the Tel al-Zaatar refugee camp massacre. While disciplinary action was taken, his actions caught the attention of General Garrigus. Bledsoe was reassigned to Garrigus’ detail and quickly rose through the ranks. When Garrigus retired in 1987 Bledsoe held the rank of a Major. Bledsoe was assigned to Okinawa where he observed China’s growing military strength. His report, entitled The New Nuclear Power was largely ignored until after the Berlin Wall fell in 1989.

Bledsoe returned to the United States in 1990, where he was stationed at Fort McNair in Washington, DC. During the Gulf War, Bledsoe was responsible for tracking new initiatives in warfare and weaponry, including the use of RPV drones and Navstar GPS. It was during his research of these new weapons that Bledsoe encountered Anthony Anthros, a pre-eminent scientist in the field of bio-tech engineering.

By the end of the war, Bledsoe, now a Colonel, headed several research initiatives for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under the Clinton Administration. It was in his role as an advisor to the JCOS that Colonel Bledsoe testified before the Senate Committee on technology and new types of warfare. His testimony outlined scenarios for World War Three. Congress and the Pentagon were unprepared for Bledsoe’s doomsday scenario. He was forced into early retirement. In the wake of 9/11, Bledsoe’s detractors decried his vision of the future and called him a technological Cassandra, noting that he failed to take into account box cutters. Early in 2002, Jonas Bledsoe formed The Berkut Group with Anthony Anthros. The purpose of their group was to engage in the development of bio-military weapons outside governmental influence. The Berkut Group is a private company with unknown sources of funding.

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Jae was born into a family of Korean migrant workers who resided in the Phnom Penh Providence of Cambodia. His father was a woodworker and his mother labored in the rice fields. He lived there until 1980 when his parents were murdered by the Khmer Rouge Guerrillas and he was sent by his uncle to live in a Taoist monastery in the Hubei region of China. Overcome by vengeance and anger, Jae’s uncle believed that his nephew needed the spiritual guidance that only a Taoist temple could offer.

His formidable years were spent at the Yeon Kim School of Taoist meditation in the Wudang Mountains. It was here that he learned the works of Taoist Monk, Chen Tuan, and strived to live his life by the philosophies of the Taoist faith: oneness, dynamic balance, cyclical growth and harmonious action. As Jae became older, he slowly dissociated himself with the monastery and formal Taoist education as he became more interested in Wudang martial Arts. Having completed his own personal growth at the Yeon Kim School, Jae eventually left the Wudang region in search of a secular education.

He enrolled in the Gibeau International Boarding School in Berne, Switzerland. Labeled an outcast and often harassed, Jae isolated himself, becoming a mediocre student. It was not until he reached Russell University that Jae displayed his potential, excelling in Philosophy and Physics. He chose to specialize in biophysics, writing his thesis on the Mind-Body interface; studying how consciousness is related to matter. Avant-garde research and field study he conducted created a name for Mr. Huang as a renowned, and universally respected, authority in the fields of mind control and meditation, frequently speaking at symposiums and contributing to various scholarly publications.

For an undisclosed amount of time the Berkut Group tracked Jae’s career and eventually asked him to join the organization. Though Mr. Huang was reluctant to join what he described as a “questionable organization,” he later acquiesced to their offer when he acknowledged the virtue his involvement could bring to the Berkut Group. After a thorough training process and an integration period, Jae assumed the role as the chair of the Endophysics Department, developing the wing of the Berkut Group that oversees all aspects of mental control and spirituality.

While working for the Berkut Group with their best Bionic test subject, Sarah Corvus, Jae fell in love with her, and they became romantically involved. Eventually this romance lent a personal aspect to his greatest professional failure, as Sarah proved unable to mentally control the killing machine within her, and rebelled against the Berkut Group, going on a killing rampage.

Jae however managed to exercise control over his own impulses, by not allowing his romantic feelings for Sarah to get in the way of doing what was called for: He fired the shots that ended Sarah’s killing spree, terminating her life (this is the opening scene of the pilot).

The resulting psychological trauma caused him to take a hiatus from his work with the Berkut Group, retiring to a life of seclusion in the woods of the Pacific Northwest, though he did agree to return if and when they resumed human experimentation.

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Photo via BionicWebsite.com/NBC

Today’s character background focuses on Jaime Sommers’ nemesis: Sarah Corvus. Via ethicalbionics.org, we get a nice summary of her character.

Sarah Corvus was born in Tacoma Washington to Cynthia and James Corvus. At the time, James Corvus was a captain stationed at Fort Lewis until his death in 1991 in the first Gulf War. His helicopter went down over Southern Iraq, but his body was never recovered. After his death, Cynthia Corvis moved Sarah to Lynn, Washington, a small town two hours outside Olympia. There, she attended Brighton Elementary School and Lincoln High School. At the top of her class, Corvus was a popular girl who headed the varsity cheerleading squad and competed in the winter biathlon. Her skills in marksmanship, a sport her father taught her before his death, won her a scholarship to University of Washington.

At the University of Washington Corvus majored in engineering with a minor in biology. Along with her studies, Corvus continued biathlon training and gained notoriety as a serious contender for 2002 United States Olympic Biathalon Team. During an Olympic qualifying round early in 2001, Corvus tore her ACL, requiring extensive surgery and rendering her Olympic dreams an impossibility.

After recovering from her injury, Corvus was recruited by the Sykes Group, a private military and security firm. Prized for her marksmanship, they trained her in hand-to-hand combat, communications and stealth maneuvers. She served briefly in Sierra Leone, escorting American diamond traders. In early 2003, she went into Iraq ahead of US forces to protect vital private interests. During a mission in Falluja, Corvus intercepted a rebel attack, rescuing Corporal Patrick Shanihan. While driving him back to his base, their jeep hit an IED. Corvus emerged unscathed, however, Corporal Shanihan lost both legs and his right arm.

Shortly after the incident, in October 2003, Corvus requested and was granted a month’s furlong home. While there, Jonas Bledsoe, the former Army Colonel and co-founder of the Berkut group contacted Corvus and convinced her to leave the Sykes group. She volunteered for a new procedure meant to enhance the human body beyond its current abilities and endurance.

The experiment went terribly wrong. Corvus went rogue in April of 2004. She was missing until August of that same year when she rampaged through the Berkut Group compound, killing most of its inhabitants, including many of the scientists who had experimented on her. She was killed by her trainer and lover at the end of this rampage, dying of several gunshot wounds on August 12, 2004.

Ethicbionics.com is very well done viral marketing site created as an "independent" companion to the official NBC site. There is lots of cool info and background to be found. Take a look.

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Michelle Ryan as Jaime Sommers/ Via NBC

We started this blog by jumping right into commentary on the new show, so as we ramp up to the premiere of Bionic Woman let’s take a step back and get to know the character’s backstories.

Via the official BW site.

Jaime Sommers was born on February 23, 1983 in Van Horne, Iowa, to Ethan and Madeline Jo Sommers. Ethan and Madeline were political activists, for which Ethan received some public notoriety. Both parents traveled a lot for their causes, and could be away for days or weeks at a time. When he would return home, Ethan always brought back photographs of his travels for Jaime, and, even at a young age, influenced Jaime’s love for photography. In 1992, Jaime’s sister, Becca Sommers, was born.

Jaime attended the local public school, Meskwaki High School, in Van Horne. She was a very active student; she was the forward on the school’s field hockey team, contributed to and edited the school literary magazine, was a success on debate squad, and participated in the photography club. She was popular among the students and a favorite of her professors.

With neither of her parents in lucrative professions, Jaime helped contribute to the family by getting jobs around the neighborhood. She baby-sat, delivered newspapers, and was hired as a hostess and waitress at a family-style restaurant called Jelly’s Eatery.

A year before Jaime was to graduate high school, Madeline was diagnosed with malignant stage II breast cancer. Jaime, who always believed her parents’ busy life on the road prevented Madeline from getting an earlier diagnosis, quit most of her extracurricular activities to help care for her mom. Her grades slowly began to suffer, but she managed to graduate in the top 7% of her class in 2001. When Madeline’s condition worsened, Jaime threw aside her plans for college to stay close to her mother. She continued to work, but became more and more involved as a caretaker for her mother.

In 2004, after a lengthy battle with cancer, Madeline Jo Sommers died. Immediately after the funeral, Jaime left for the west coast, leaving Becca behind. Upon her arrival on the west coast, Jaime quickly found herself a cramped apartment in a college town and a job working at a local bar. She enrolled in the psychology program at the nearby college and was able to afford tuition since she had saved up a little bit of money while taking care of her mother. In a bioethics class she took as an elective a few semesters later, she met a highly regarded professor, Dr. Will Anthros, whom she eventually started dating.

Tracking Jaime down, Becca showed up on her doorstep in 2006 with a duffel bag of a few belongings asking to stay with her. Jaime allowed Becca to move in, but again the need to provide for her family, this time her sister, forced Jaime to drop out of college.

Sackhoff Promoting Smoking - Via NBC

The signature image of Bionic Woman, thus far, is not of the heroine Jamie Sommers. Instead, the image that the press has fallen in love with the photograph of Katee Sackhoff’s evil Sarah Corvus, dripping wet in the rain as she waits for Jamie to come and fight her in the pre-air pilot … and while she waits, she smokes.

There can be no denying that it is a great photograph. Sackhoff’s cool control is a stark contrast to the elements that are fighting to invade her, she is oblivious to the rain that would make others uncomfortable. When Jamie arrives and words are exchanged, Corvus mentions that the anthrocytes that are part of the bionic technology heal her lungs, so she smokes.

Unfortunately, the smoking villain has become such a cliche, that I’m afraid it’s considered original again. This doesn’t sit well with me. Broadcast television, like it or not, has a responsibility to the general public. Study after study concludes that kids who see celebrities smoke will try smoking themselves. While I am a champion of the new BW plumbing the depths of human nature, I wish they would leave smoking out of it. There is never a place to show actors smoking on screen, ever. Especially not a primetime show.

Why would Sackhoff agree to be filmed smoking? Surely she had reservations about the promotion of smoking (I hope so anyway). And make no mistake about it, she is promoting smoking simply by agreeing to do it on screen. I’m not sure which is worse, smoking on screen or insulting the fans who came to see you at ComiCon.

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Bionic Woman producer David Eick gave a recent interview where he shed some light on his views about the “woman” part of Bionic Woman.

“In the old days, it was about ‘women can do everything men can do.’ That doesn’t seem to be as much of an issue now,” says executive producer David Eick. Today, “it’s more about if we can accept that women can do what men can do, do we judge it differently? Backing that is what I call the Peter Parker ethos: someone who is not sure of him or herself as a person, let alone a hero. And I’m just applying that to a female perspective.”

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Her bionic implants, of course. Katee Sackhoff, who plays the vengeful Sarah Corvis on Bionic Woman, was on Jimmy Kimmel’s talk show recently to discuss a few things about Battlestar Galactica and a lot about Bionic Woman. She also does some innuendo about Sarah Corvis’ implants, outs her brother’s derogatory nickname, and talks about being trapped in the bathroom at Comicon.

We love Katee, but towards the end of the interview she breaks the classic rule for young stars trying to break into the big time by dissing the fans she has now. No Katee, don’t do it! Bionic Woman and Battlestar Galactica need all the fans they can get!

Edit: Sunday night on the ShaunOMac radio show I was asked about this clip, which I had initially written about on watchingbsg.com and apparently others have commented on with similar dismay. It had been a while since I had watched the clip when Shaun asked the question, and I mistakenly said Katee called her fans “freaks” during the interview. That was just my memory playing tricks on me … she let’s Jimmy back her into a corner where she implies her fans are pretty weird, but she never actually says the word “freaks” and I apologize for the error.

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Lost in the controversy over the recasting of Jamie Sommers’ sister is the news that when NBC jettisoned the deaf character on Bionic Woman, they also ditched the monkeys.

Apparently the new Jamie was originally going to be a lab worker, not a bartender. And her unusually strong connection with the monkeys in the lab was going to be explained by her deaf sister. Jamie’s familiarity with sign language helped her communicate with the monkeys, bringing a whole new depth to her character. The character of Jamie’s sister would add additional darkness and internal conflict to Jamie, and the concept would add a whole plethora of potential monkey moments into the show as well.

And then NBC ditched both the depth of character and the monkeys. As you can see from the above photo of a monkey with Natalie Portman, this was truly a great loss for the show. BuddyTV explains why the decision to recast Jamie’s sister will hurt the show and the characters, noting that “Jamie’s deaf sister would have symbolized the unfairness of the bionic technology being used for warfare, all the while providing the new Bionic Woman with a secret self-loathing that would play out at the very sight of her sister’s struggles to fit into the world.” And we could have had monkeys!

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