This time of year is so full of good news and bad news, often on the same day. The networks seem intent on getting all the cancellation and pickup news out before their big “upfront” schedule presentations to the advertisers, which take place next week. Here’s the latest:
Hot on the heels of the sad breaking news that Awake was canceled by NBC comes the excellent news from The CW that Green Arrow-based Arrow and the reboot of the 1980s series Beauty and the Beast have both been picked up for series, and spy-fi Nikita has been renewed for a third season. Sadly, first year show about teen witches The Secret Circle has been cancelled.
Variety first broke the news about the pilot pickups. As a reminder, which apparently even Variety needs, this Beauty and the Beast is not the reimagining of the classic fairy tale; that Beauty and the Beast is a pilot for ABC, and we still don’t know for sure about that one.
In The CW‘s Beauty and the Beast, the beauty, Catherine (Kristen Kreuk), saw her mother murdered nine years ago, and then saw the murderer killed by Vincent (Jay Ryan), who was himself the victim of a military experiment gone horribly wrong. Catherine, now an NYPD homicide detective, has finally found Vincent after years of looking, and will protect him and his identity. They’re calling it a modern day romance with a procedural twist.
Arrow (WE ARE SO EXCITED ABOUT THIS) is based on the DC Comics hero Green Arrow, about billionaire playboy Oliver Queen (Stephen Amell), who returns home from being missing for five years after a shipwreck, with a new attitude and some exceptional skills. The script is being written by Greg Berlanti, Marc Guggenheim and Andrew Kreisberg. Joining Amell in the cast are David Ramsey, Katie Cassidy, Susanna Thompson, Willa Holland, Colin Donnell, Colin Salmon, Paul Blackthorne, and Jamey Sheridan.
Trained spy/assassin Nikita (Maggie Q) wages a war against Division, the agency that created her. In her corner are Michael (Shane West), the man who trained her, and Alex (Lyndsy Fonseca), her protegee and former partner on the inside.
Nikita airs Fridays at 8/7c on The CW; the season finale airs May 18.
We’ll keep you posted as the news keeps rolling in!
