Sci-Fi has a long and proud history of cancellation. Perfectly good shows (and plenty of plain awful shows) have seen the axe for a multitude of different reasons. Let’s take a look at five sure-fire ways to ruin a decent show.

1) Air your show on FOX
As Firefly, The Sarah Connor Chronicles and Dollhouse has shown, quality has no impact on the lifetime of your show if you choose to air it on FOX. In fact, it would seem that longevity in FOX is inversely proportional to quality. Firefly was absolute quality. Just Google “firefly cancelled” to see the outcry. Dollhouse, although still a good show, wasn’t near Firefly’s calibre, and therefore lasted for slightly longer before reaching the same grisly demise. And let’s not even get started on Sliders! That’s it, Fox: create some of the finest science fiction of the last decade before callously shooting it down. Good call!

2) Kill off the lead character (or at least get rid of them unceremoniously)
Once they’re gone, the show can’t be far behind. Although Earth: Final Conflict lasted for some time after the death of William Boone, played by Kevin Kilner. However, when you base your show so firmly around the lead character’s personality and moral conflicts, you have a huge amount of creative rebuilding and restructuring that is not easy to successfully achieve. Even Ben Browder’s introduction to Stargate SG-1 to replace Richard Dean Anderson, although relatively well managed, signalled the beginning of the end for the show (even if it did provide enough energy to delay the inevitable for a year or two)

3) Go on for too long
Star Trek is probably the finest example. You can’t keep producing top quality stories week-in, week-out for fifteen years. Voyager and Enterprise probably didn’t need to happen. Deep Space Nine was tremendous, and after that the franchise should probably have taken three or four years out to refresh and re-energise. Voyager’s premise was strong, but it’s implementation was poor. As soon as the writer’s think creating an incredibly inaccurate Irish village in the holodeck is a good idea, it’s time to panic. Being from Ireland, the whole thing was laughable. And it was never going to be good sci-fi.

4) Sex it up!
Ratings are falling, reviews are mediocre, what do you do? Get your most attractive female cast member to take her clothes off, regardless of the plot making sense. Nudity is always a winner, right? Sadly, it’s not. Enterprise’s attempts to “sex it up” in season three were, frankly, ludicrous. Star Trek, according to Gene Roddenberry, was never adverse to lascivious female aliens: Orion slave girls, anyone? But quite frankly, making Jolene Blalock little more than eye-candy was a poor call. It didn’t fit the character, and was blatantly an attempt to attract an audience of hormonal college boys. Are the same men interested in Jolene Blalock’s “assets” going to care about the ramifications of a temporal anomaly? I doubt. Voyager and Enterprise’s writers made the other cast act like giggling school girls around Jeri Ryan’s Seven of Nine and Blalock’s T’Pol respectively. It wasn’t clever, nor effective.

5) When all else fails, add zombies

Take this:

Note the stirring music, high production values, moral conflict and powerful premise.

Now, take five years later:

Note the alien vampires, poor acting, poor dialogue and little or no moral/emotional conflict whatsoever? Just gunshots and explosions.

The decline still brings a tear to my eye.

Stargate: Universe show-runner Brad Wright has revealed that the dark atmosphere of the show’s first season was only the beginning: the show is set to get darker next year.

"When you try to adopt a more realistic tone, where frankly we don’t win every time, then there have to be real-world repercussions like death and injury and loss," Wright said. "You can dig deeper into characters and the deeper you dig the repercussions can get bigger. We are going to some places with these characters, and already have really, that we would never go with the heroes of our other series.”

And things don’t bode will for Everett Young, played by Louis Ferreira. 

According to Robert C. Cooper, "After everything he’s been through – and it gets worse for him initially at the beginning of Season 2 – it’s impossible to imagine that a person wouldn’t go to a very dark place at least for a short period of time.

In other news, according to GateWorld, we’re set to see some Stargate Atlantis actors guesting on Universe next year.  No word on who, or to what extent yet, however.

Discovery Channel have announced that they’re teaming up with Steven Spielberg to create a new mini-series: Future Earth.  It’s big on the ‘sci’, but less so on the ‘fi’. 

The show is designed to show us what our future will look like in 25, 50 and 100 years based upon the opinions of leading scholars and experts.

The press release follows:

DISCOVERY CHANNEL ANNOUNCES DEVELOPMENT DEAL WITH STEVEN SPIELBERG, DREAMWORKS TELEVISION AND DREAMWORKS ANIMATION

Discovery Channel announced today that it is working to develop a new mini-series project with Academy(R) Award-winning filmmaker Steven Spielberg, DreamWorks Television and DreamWorks Animation SKG, Inc. (Nasdaq: DWA) entitled FUTURE EARTH (wt). DreamWorks Television and DreamWorks Animation will co-develop this future project, of which Spielberg will personally oversee development.

“We pride ourselves on bringing the best storytellers in the business to Discovery,” said Clark Bunting, president and general manager, Discovery Channel and president, Science Channel. “Steven Spielberg, his team at DreamWorks Television and DreamWorks Animation are at the top of that list. We are excited and look forward to collaborating with them on an exciting array of new nonfiction programs.”

FUTURE EARTH aims to be an epic mini-series examining what life on Earth will be like in 25, 50 and 100 years. The mini-series will draw from a vast number of sources, including the leading futurists, scholars and great minds of today, to dramatize and explore how various facets of our daily lives – health and medicine, technology, the environment, the military, the economy and media – will evolve over the next century.

“I am excited to be back in business with DreamWorks Animation and all the active imaginations and creative artists at the best animation company in the world today. Joining together with Discovery, we have an opportunity to bring exciting new experiences to take television audiences into the imagined future of planet Earth, said Steven Spielberg.

“We are thrilled to join forces with Discovery on such a uniquely positioned new mini-series and look forward to reuniting with Steven and his team to bring FUTURE EARTH to life for viewers in creative and innovative ways,” added Jeffrey Katzenberg, Chief Executive Officer of DreamWorks Animation.

“We are all enormous fans of what Discovery did with PLANET EARTH and LIFE, and how they were able to expose us to the world around us in a way we had never seen it before. With FUTURE EARTH, we endeavor to do the same with the world of the future,” said Darryl Frank and Justin Falvey, Co-Heads of DreamWorks Television and Executive Producers on the project.

It’s official. The rumours have been flying around for months, but FOX have finally confirmed that the eighth season of 24 will be the last. Jack Bauer and friends/enemies will bow out on May 24.

Will Jack be killed? Will there be a super-bad villian revealed? Who will return? Perhaps the best way to end it would be doing what 24 has always done best: having a few really unpredictable twists.

The FOX press release is attached below:

“24: DAY EIGHT” WILL BE THE AWARD-WINNING SERIES’ FINAL SEASON

Two-Hour Series Finale Airs Monday, May 24, on FOX

In a joint decision made by 24’s star and executive producer Kiefer Sutherland, executive producer and showrunner Howard Gordon, Twentieth Century Fox Television, Imagine Entertainment and Fox Broadcasting Company, it was determined that the acclaimed series will end its remarkable eight-season run. Jack Bauer’s last day on FOX will conclude when the final two hours of “Day Eight” air Monday, May 24 (8:00-10:00 PM ET/PT). As the countdown to the series’ climactic conclusion races on, the final 11 hours will air uninterrupted Mondays (9:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX.

Multiple award-winning series star Kiefer Sutherland reflected on the show’s run: “This has been the role of a lifetime, and I will never be able to fully express my appreciation to everyone who made it possible. While the end of the series is bittersweet, we always wanted 24 to finish on a high note, so the decision to make the eighth season our last was one we all agreed upon. This feels like the culmination of all our efforts from the writers to the actors to our fantastic crew and everyone at Fox. Looking ahead to the future, Howard Gordon and I are excited about the opportunity to create the feature film version of 24. But when all is said and done, it is the loyal worldwide fan base that made it possible for me to have the experience of playing the role of Jack Bauer, and for that I am eternally grateful.”

Executive producer and showrunner Howard Gordon said, “Kiefer and I have loved every minute of making 24, but we all believe that now is the right time to call it a day. I echo his sentiments of gratitude toward the show’s amazing creative team, as well as the studio and network who have always believed in us and shown us unbelievable support.”

“24 is so much more than just a TV show – it has redefined the drama genre and created one of the most admired action icons in television history,” said Peter Rice, Chairman, Entertainment, Fox Networks Group. Kevin Reilly, President, Entertainment, Fox Broadcasting Company added, “We are extremely proud of this groundbreaking series and will be forever thankful to Kiefer, the producers, the cast and crew for everything they’ve put into 24 over the years. It’s truly been an amazing and unforgettable eight days.”

“We are so grateful to Kiefer and Howard who have really poured their hearts and souls into making this show over the past eight seasons,” commented Gary Newman and Dana Walden, Chairmen, Twentieth Century Fox Television. “To everyone who contributed to this iconic series over its amazing run, we want to extend our heartfelt appreciation for your incredible work.”

Added Imagine Entertainment’s Brian Grazer, “I’m so proud to have been a part of 24, which has become such a cultural phenomenon. And to Kiefer and Howard and everyone who has worked on the show, many thanks.”

Now in its eighth season with Kiefer Sutherland starring as the heroic Jack Bauer, the inventive and suspenseful 24 has been nominated for a total of 68 Emmy Awards, winning for Outstanding Drama Series in 2006. Over the course of seven seasons, Sutherland garnered seven Emmy nominations and one win for Outstanding Lead Actor – Drama Series. While the series gained global recognition, Sutherland’s portrayal of the legendary character penetrated the American psyche like no other dramatic television character to become part of the English lexicon.

Premiering November 6, 2001, 24 employed a pioneering split-screen, fast-paced format with complex interweaving storylines as viewers followed anti-terrorism agent Jack Bauer through 24 pulse-pounding episodes, each covering one hour and presented in real time. Subsequent seasons combined the show’s unique and trend-setting format while delivering compelling new elements and attracting talented actors and guest stars, including the Emmy Award-winning Cherry Jones (President Allison Taylor). The series also currently stars Mary Lynn Rajskub (Chloe O’Brian), Anil Kapoor (Omar Hassan), Annie Wersching (Renee Walker), Katee Sackhoff (Dana Walsh), Mykelti Williamson (Brian Hastings), Freddie Prinze Jr. (Cole Ortiz), Chris Diamantopoulos (Rob Weiss) and John Boyd (Arlo Glass).

The first six seasons were set in Los Angeles, and following the strike-induced delay of Season Seven, “24: Redemption,” a two-hour film bridging Seasons Six and Seven, was set in Africa. Washington, D.C. was the setting for Season Seven, and the final season of 24 finds Jack Bauer thwarting a terrorist attack in New York.

At the conclusion of Season Eight, 24 will have a produced a total of 194 episodes (including “24: Redemption”), making it one of the longest-running action television shows in history.

Tune in Monday, March 29 (9:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) for the next all-new installment of 24 and Monday, April 5 (8:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) for a special two-hour episode.

Created by Joel Surnow and Robert Cochran, 24 is a production of 20th Century Fox Television and Imagine Television in association with Teakwood Lane Productions. Howard Gordon, Evan Katz, David Fury, Manny Coto, Brannon Braga, Brad Turner, Alex Gansa, Kiefer Sutherland and Brian Grazer are executive producers, while Chip Johannessen and Patrick Harbinson serve as co-executive producers. Brad Turner will direct the series finale.”

According to star Neil Patrick Harris, plans are afoot to have Dr. Horrible and his rather fantastic Sing-Along Blog return as a feature film.

Speaking to MTV, Harris said, "Apparently they’re making a ‘Dr. Horrible’ sequel — a feature film, I hope… I hope they cast me in it — we’ll see."

"I don’t know of what scale. They’re talking all options, because they made the first ‘Dr. Horrible’ in five days on no budget at all — that was its intention."

Sci-Fi/Fantasy films and television have had their fair share of lackluster ladies.  I recently came across an article that discussed the worst action heroines that have disgraced the small and silver screens.  Kennedy may be the most hated character in Buffyverse; Arwen was content to just sit around waiting for her man; and Queen Amidala let herself die of a broken heart despite her obligation as a new mother.  While these bad eggs exist, the superior women of Sci-Fi come along to remind us why we keep watching.  I’ve compiled a list of ten Sci-Fi heroines that top the chart of cool, in no particular order (because that would have been unfair, and way too exhausting):

1.  Buffy Summers  (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)

She’s witty, she’s hot, and she’ll kick your vampy ass all over town.  Buffy changed the face of TV high school drama by giving girls the aspiration to carry stakes and crossbows in their purse instead of just lipstick.  Along with the Scoobie gang, many of us shared the same touchstones of growing up, just perhaps without the bloodshed.  Buffy’s graduation, the death of a parent, and tumultuous love were all some of the things we could relate to, expertly written by Joss Whedon and his team.  But perhaps most of the credit should be given to SMG, who’s depth, sarcasm, and playful wit brought the legendary Slayer of Sunnydale to life.

2.  Princess Leia Organa  (Star Wars trilogy)

An iconic figure since the debut of Star Wars, Leia was the princess that empowered young girls.  She proved that royalty could be headstrong, intelligent, and didn’t wear a bra (feminist statement or lack of underwire in space?  you be the judge).  Leia’s hair started a cultural phenomena, and her gold bikini is still pretty hot over twenty years later.  You would think the daughter of Amidala might be clingy, but Leia loved Han Solo and orchestrated a mission to rescue him.  Leia is worthy of all the praise, and the action figures.

3.  Leeloo  (The Fifth Element)

What if the key to saving Earth and all of humanity was 5’8, strikingly beautiful, and running around in strategically placed bandages?  Leeloo is not only all of these things, she’s also adorable when eating chicken and figuring out make-up.  She can also kick major alien ass and learn the entire human history in a few hours.  No one can forget “Leeloo Dallas, Mulitpass”, or that strange neon orange hair that only Milla Jovovich can pull off.  Let’s just be glad Corbin Dallas is sexy enough to convince her the Earth’s worth saving.

4.  Hermoine Granger  (Harry Potter series)

She’s the youngest lady on this list, but she certainly packs an academic wallop worthy of being recognized.  Hermoine is known at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry for being a know-it-all, Muggle-born, and the brightest witch of her age.  Though she doesn’t fight with her fists (okay, there was that one awesome time – Malfoy!), Hermoine wages battle with her mind and her trusty wand, which might be even cooler.  Smarts and intellect count for a lot in my book, and Hermoine certainly makes the grade.

5.  Sydney Bristow  (Alias)

What’s cooler than getting to dress up and kick ass while doing it?  Sydney and her endless trunk of disguises played double agent for the CIA in J.J. Abram’s entertaining spy drama.  Syd had Daddy issues, a mysterious (and sexy) spy boyfriend, and Bradley Cooper as a best friend (lucky girl).  Syd dealt with a lot of hardships, but her sweetness and determination saw her through the darkest times, including a zombie sister and an evil best friend.  But after a tough day of saving the world, Agent Bristow seemed like the kind of super spy you could just share a drink and some girl talk with.  The best spy is the relatable kind.   

6.  Ellen Ripley  (Alien saga)

Sigourney Weaver made women just as valuable as men on the final frontier.  No longer were they in the background translating dialects (no offense, Uhura) or waiting around to be saved.  Ripley, throughout the Alien movies, did what she had to do to stay alive where no one would hear her scream.  She protected her team, her child, and the world from aliens and corporate corruption by sacrificing her own safety and eventually her life.  Ripley bended gender stereotypes and gave Hollywood a new kind of action hero, not afraid to shoot a gun in her skivvies.

7.  Juliet Burke  (Lost)

On a mysterious island that no one can find, Juliet manages to maintain her cool surprisingly well.  If you’ve watched an episode of Lost, you know how hard that is.  Brought on as a fertility specialist to solve a puzzling epidemic of killer pregnancies on the Island, Juliet becomes deeply tangled in the web of the Dharma Initiative and Ben Linus’ pile of bullshit.  Her seemingly stoic nature was perfect Ben lackey criteria, doing his evil bidding until she decided to switch teams and play for the good guys.  Juliet is strong, intelligent, and cool as a cucumber under enormous stress (and ticking time bombs – literally), and that’s why she’s the Lostie I’d pick in any crisis.     

8.  Trinity  (The Matrix)

Computer hackers might have been those losers in mom’s basement before 1999.  But after Trinity, they were hot, decked in leather, and owned an unlimited supply of shades and ammo.  There’s probably no one cooler than Trinity, or no one cooler than I can think of.  Out of all the ladies on this list, she can learn how to fly a helicopter in three seconds and kick your ass a thousand different ways if you give her an hour or two.  And in slow-motion.  Dodge that.

9.  Neytiri  (Avatar)

The newest woman to the list is tall, beautiful, and blue.  Neytiri is the cat-like Na’vi princess of James Cameron’s Pandora, existing organically by living off the earth and connecting with her world.  Her peaceful symbiosis with nature is what makes her such a great new addition to feminine canon, but also her gargantuan bow and arrow for keeping you the hell off her planet.

10.  Sarah Connor  (T2: Judgment Day)

Everyone remembers The Terminator, but Sarah Connor didn’t become a presence until T2: Judgment Day.  Having been locked away for talking nonsense, Sarah made sure to tone those guns in case Arnold ever showed his face again.  Sarah Connor busting out of the hospital is one of the best payback scenes in cinema history (that orderly certainly had it coming).  She has a rough exterior, but underneath it all, she’s driven by an overpowering love for her son.  Maybe just a little rage, too.

It’s that time of the year again, the time when film audiences wait with baited breath to find out which films and filmmakers have been honoured with that most tantamount of accolades, the Academy Award Nomination. Naturally, the only thing better than being nominated for an Oscar is winning one, but it’s still a huge honour to be nominated, especially for Science Fiction films that manage to make it through. Though geek has arguably been becoming chic since the late 90’s, ours is not the most mainstream of genres. In recent years, this has been changing and more and more Scifi and Fantasy films have been rearing their heads at Academy Awards ceremonies; judging from the list below it looks like this positive trend is continuing with a vengeance this year!

There are of course loads of nominations for loads of films, you can check them all out at the Oscars official site here. In the meantime, here’s a rundown of the nominations netted by genre films:

Avatar

Art Direction
Cinematography
Directing
Film Editing
Music (Original Score)
Best Picture
Sound Editing
Sound Mixing
Visual Effects

Coraline

Animated Feature Film

District 9

Film Editing
Best Picture
Visual Effects
Writing (Adapted Screenplay)

Fantastic Mr. Fox

Animated Feature Film
Music (Original Score)

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Cinematography

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Art Direction
Costume Design

The Lovely Bones

Actor in a Supporting Role

The Princess and the Frog

Animated Feature Film
Music (Original Song)
Music (Original Song)

Star Trek

Sound Editing
Sound Mixing
Visual Effects
Makeup

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Sound Mixing

Up

Animated Feature Film
Music (Original Score)
Best Picture
Sound Editing
Writing (Original Screenplay)

A mixed bag, certainly, and not uncontroversial. While the fantastic District 9 has come away with a respectable for nominations, Avatar’s managed to score a whopping 9 nominations – including one for Best Picture. Now I loved Avatar for what it was, a technological achievement and a special effects marvel – but the story’s hardly Best Picture material, surely? The cynic in me suspects the huge marketing hype-generating behemoth is behind this nomination, but that’s probably just me.

I mean, it’s very pretty and all, but wasn’t the story a bit flat?

Most notably snubbed film this year? In my opinion, Moon deserves to have at least a nod for best Director and Actor, perhaps even Best Picture and Soundtrack too. Whether it would win any of those is debatable, but as a fantastic little film I feel it should at least have had its achievements recognised by the Academy.

Who do you think will win? Who do you think SHOULD win? Answers on the back of a postcard … or in the comments!

Resident Evil as a franchise is one of the most successful genre game series there is, whether it could survive in films was confirmed by both the original and by Apocalypse. Making a third, although using a tried and tested method capitalised upon by DOOM, had its risks of being caught by sequelitis, the horrible disease which eventually afflicts and drags down franchises that don’t know when to stop.

The film is essentially the same as any before it. Super person vs. Zombies, super person wins, eventually. Until either killed off by a sequel or the Zombies disappointingly are gone. However this time, it’s even more doom-full then before, pretty much everyone has died and from zombie horror the movie has transformed to post-apocalyptic thriller. A confusing start giving you flashbacks on the first of the series is followed by a dull, emotionless introduction by the main actress herself, Milla Jovovich. Let’s be honest, she’s better doing cool flips and cutting up weird mutants then she is at the sparse bits of dialogue she has to struggle her way through.

Ok ok, she is one of the coolest and sexiest heroines on screen, unless you’ve seen Underworld…

The film centres around miss impossible joining a group of survivors, trekking across the west of America looking for anyone left, with a few crazy zombie… or zombie crow… scenes thrown in.

Worryingly the Zombie Crows were the scariest part of the film

As with every film of it’s type, RE3 relies upon so many cool scenes that even if the film were to be absolute throw-it-in-the-fire trash you’d be able to remember those scenes to recount to your mates for years, to the point all you can remember is them, and suddenly think “I want to see them again!” And in this category, as with it’s predecessors, it does remarkably well. From the “Sorry Stevie” opening to the final words it gives you plenty of moments to smile at and want to quote or mime at any possible opportunity. However, sometimes you’re just left thinking “well why didn’t she just do the funky flamey thing again”. The film didn’t ever really set a pace of increasing “cool” to keep you satisfied, after a bit you find ordinary fighting just plain boring.

And I’ll admit, the girl in aviators was both hotter and cooler then the main character, which took away her thunder a little. I’ve always been someone for a lass with a shotgun.

The cool fire thingy… if only she had just kept doing it the film would have been a lot shorter

However, maybe I’m being a little harsh. The fight scenes are pretty cool, in fact very cool. They’re just not as good as they could be. There isn’t a sense of escalating intensity like there should be. That is until the big baddie starts sprouting tentacles… The rhythmical music makes the fights even more high-adrenaline then they already are and adds something resembling urgency to the occasional image of emotionless faces as they face up another enemy, somewhat of a saving grace for those moments.

Attempting to include too many characters resulted in an under-exploration of the main ones.

As much as this film is supposed to be slightly tongue-in-cheek, the evil genius behind it all is just too much of an evil genius. There is no character exploration, no doubts, he is needlessly cruel with no background reason… to his own scientists. And this doesn’t stop here, it is true of almost all the characters. The acting is shabby, dialogue poorly written and clichéd, character relationships shallow or unexplored at all. I know this is a game-based horror sequel but a little effort would have gone a long way to improve the non-action sequences. Most of these are taken up bull the dull actionless and dialogue-dumbed travelling through the middle section of the film, followed by the similar lack of intensity in the psyche up for the last fight, which included some almost despairingly fake crying.

The final fight is equally disappointing, no cloud of flames, just a clone with a keyboard. The final boss manages to last a grand total of five minutes weirdly interchanging between. Animal roars and completely unaltered vocals, which jars you out of the moment somewhat. What’s worse is that immediately before the film does away with all the unnecessary characters it introduced in the first place, leaving you with no idea what happens to them at all.

After such successes as the first two of the series, and other game-based horrors DOOM and Silent Hill, this film was a disappointment. It stuck to a formula which had been perfected already and failed to hit the par of what game fans would be looking for. On the plus side, the ending was a perfect lead up to a much more spectacular sequel. But once sequalitis has been caught, it might never go away.

The UK TV channel LIVING have created an online alternate reality game to help drum up support for the launch of Season 5 here in the UK. The game will present one very lucky player the chance to appear in the show, seems to be a prize worth fighting for.

Here is what LIVING have told us about the game:

Supernatural season four ended in suspense as Lucifer was freed from hell and on LIVING season five follows Sam and Dean Winchester as they face their toughest battle yet; the apocalypse. To promote the new series, LIVING is creating the Fight the Apocalypse ARG, which calls on Supernatural fans to mobilise their armies and join the fight against Lucifer.

The ARG is based around collecting hidden symbols – ‘Enochian Sigils’ – which players must locate, photograph and send via MMS to a shortcode,. One of the first truly cross-platform campaigns of its type, the ARG utilises online, mobile, print and real world elements.

Enochian Sigils have been hidden online and at real world locations throughout the UK and clues to the Sigil locations will be delivered by Castiel (Misha Collins) in specially filmed sequences on the Fight the Apocalypse website (http://www.Luciferiscoming.com). Once located, Sigils are photographed on any mobile device and using Image recognition technology – which recognises any image taken on a mobile phone camera – are uploaded to the player’s profile.

In the ARG players have two ways of making it to the top: locating and photographing Enochian Sigils, and building an online army of support. Players can invite friends to join their army via email and through Facebook. On the luciferiscoming.com website, Supernatural fans can create their own profile and contact friends to join their army, manage their game playing and collection of Enochian Sigils, as well as view other contestants’ profiles and join forces with other players. For fans who want to play on the move, all core game functions will be available on the mobile site.

Online media partners are collaborating in the game, with some sites creating their own bespoke mini challenges for gamers to find sigils. Twitter is the social hub for Fight the Apocalypse and will countdown to the start of the game, as well as announcing new clues, and creating a community around the game and the new series of Supernatural. Followers of the Fight the Apocalypse Twitter feed will be given tips and additional mini challenges quick challenges to win extra prizes. Fans can follow the Fight the Apocalypse Twitter at www.twitter.com/fightapocalypse.

The first clue to start the hunt will be released on the 20th January. Fans can pre-register for the game now at www.luciferiscoming.com.

Reports are spreading across the web that Star Trek XII (or is it just II?)– the sequel to J.J. Abrams 2009 blockbuster – has been given a release date of June 29, 2012 by Paramount Pictures.

There’s no actual confirmation that Abrams will direct again, but Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman are attached as writers, alongside Damon Lindelof.  No plot details have yet been released.

If I remember correctly, the crew of the Enterprise had a sequel-obligation written into their contracts, so I presume they will all return.