Bloodsuckers, Zombies, and Horror/SciFi Film Festival

Blood Ties Is Back.

First up, this weekend is the return of Blood Ties to Lifetime on Friday night at 11 pm ET/PT, following their new psychic shows. This is the back half of the first season production order of 22 episodes. Lifetime originally committed to 13 episodes when they aired it back in March and it did well enough for them they picked up the back 9, and also held back the last episode of the first block to make it an even ten episodes.



Tanya Huff, the writer of the book series the TV series is based on, has been continuing to blog about it on her livejournal, especially since it recently started airing in Canada as well. At this point, Lifetime has not indicated if they want more of the series and producers are encouraging Canadian Fans to write to CITYTV and Space.

Phoenix Zombie Walk

This past weekend as part of the Phoenix Cactus ComicCon and International Horror/SciFi Film Festival Promotion, they held a Zombie Walk during the First Friday Art Walk in downtown Phoenix. Lots of pictures can be found at Amy Black's flicker archive. She's the Zombie Beauty Queen and organizer of the walk. They will be having a Zombie beauty pageant at the Comic Con in January.

Horror/SciFi Film Festival in Phoenix - with Claudia Christian & Linda Blair

Coming up next weekend, Oc 19-21, is the International Horror/SciFi Film Festival in Tempe, Arizona. Brian Pulido judges the Horror films and Michael Stackpole judges the SciFi Films. In addition to the various films that were submitted and judged, they've got some special screenings with Linda Blair, Claudia Christian, some Star Wars Fan Films, and others.

If you want to catch a lot of films at the festival, the best way is to get the VIP pass, which normally costs you $100, but since I'm involved with Leprecon, Inc., which is a sponsor of the festival, if you use the code PARTNER, you can get the VIP pass for $80.

SFTV Catchup

A few various things from the last week to catch up with....

SciFi Channel Roundup Jane Cancelled, Flash Debut So-So, Fall dates for BG: Razor and Atlantis, NBC repurposing

The SciFi Channel announced that they will not be renewing Painkiller Jane for a second season due to low ratings. They will continue to run the series through the season finale in September.

The debut of Flash Gordon on August 10th did a 1.5 household rating and around 2.1 million viewers. This was the highest debut for a new series in 2007 for SciFi, which was slightly better than when the Dresden Files debuted with a 1.4 rating back in January.

SciFi also announced some airdates for their fall shows.

Stargate Atlantis returns on September 28th for its fourth season, airing at 10 pm ET/PT and will run pretty much straight through until the mid-season finale on December 7th.

The Battlestar Galactica special "Razor" will air on Saturday, November 24th. Leading up to the broadcast will be the "Razor" minisoded that will air during Flash Gordon starting in October.

Ghost Hunters will resume its third season on Wednesday, Sept 26th and will also have its second Halloween special that will air from 11 pm to 5 am ET/PT on October 31 and will be broadcast live from one of the most haunted places in America, Waverly Hills Sanitarium in Louisville, Kentucky. Being paired up with Ghost Hunters on Wednesdays, will be the 2002 UPN series, Haunted, starring Matthew Fox, who seems to have done better with his next series, Lost. UPN pulled the series after seven episodes, leaving six episodes unaired.

SciFi looks to be planning to repurpose NBC's Journeyman, Bionic Woman and Chuck, but do not appear to have Heroes on their schedule. The last week of September shows Journeyman airing at 7 pm on Thursday with The Bionic Woman at 7 pm on Friday. On Sunday night, they have Chuck scheduled at 11 pm with Journeyman at 12 midnight. Once Doctor Who ends its run in the 8 pm Friday time slot, it may be that one of the NBC shows will take over that time slot on Oct 11th.

SciFi also last week dropped their two hour block of Tru Calling on Tuesday nights, replacing it with one episode of Dead Like Me and a repeat of a Eureka episode. That is how the schedule looks through the end of September.

Canadian TV Updates

I've found a website, TV Eh?, that is specifically about Canadian TV shows, networks and news. It looks like things will be getting a bit busier this fall for SF TV on Canadian channels, which may include some things airing before they do in the US.

Blood Ties - The series will debut this week on CityTV in Canada, with different times depending on where you are watching City TV. The show will also air on Space this fall, at 9 pm Fridays starting September 14th.

Masters of Science Fiction - Space will also air Masters of Science Fiction beginning November 4th, planning to air all six episodes.

SFTV News Roundup

Schedules Updated

The SFTV Schedules have been updated and can be viewed by the direct links. The Upcoming listing isn't quite done yet and hasn't been emailed out but will be soon.


Galactica Renewal


The SciFi Channel has renewed Battlestar Galactica for a fourth season. Instead of 20 episodes, they committed to a minimum of 13 episodes. Production is supposed to start this summer with the series likely returning next January. No news on the DVD movie they had been talking about. The full press release can be found on SciFi's press website.

Blood Ties Pictures

Lifetime has put up a basic web site to promote Blood Ties and has also made available some pictures from the initial batch of episodes.

First up is Christina Cox as Vickie Nelson, the P.I. with a degenerative eye disease.


Next is Kyle Schmid as Henry Fitzroy, a 450-year old vampire who embodies the physique of a twenty-something playboy. He also writes graphic novels (a change from the book version who writes romance novels).

Dylan Neal stars as Detective Mike Celucci, the ex-boyfriend of private investigator Vicki Nelson.

Gina Holden ("Reunion") stars as Coreen Fennel, who convinces Vicki to let her work as her assistant after her boyfriend is murdered by a demon. The first few episodes are described as follows by Lifetime:

Blood Price (Parts 1 & 2): Fearless ex-cop turned private investigator Vicki finds her entire life changes after she witnesses a bizarre murder and is suddenly thrown into a supernatural world in which she discovers her suspect is a demon and she is working alongside a 450-year-old vampire, Henry. Below is an image from the episode where Vickie is attending to Henry after he's been beaten up pretty bad.



Bad Ju-Ju: Vicki is hired by a woman desperately seeking her missing brother. With Henry's help, Vicki soon discovers that her client is more than what she appears to be. There's also Zombies, one of which has Vicki in a nasty grip on the left.


Gifted: When a young girl is left alone following her mother's death, Vicki is hired to track down her estranged father. During her investigation, Vicki and Henry discover that the young girl has special powers and an imaginary friend who might be more foe than friend.