Flixens: Movies, DVDs, TV, comic books and pop culture for women. The boys shouldn't have all the fun.

Nothing showcases the downfall of modern society better than November sweeps week, especially on the Fox network.

According to CNN, Fox will air a two-part interview with wife-throat-slasher and waiter-murderer O.J. Simpson entitled If I Did It, Here's How it Happened on November 27 and 29.  I'm sure the Brown family and the Goldman family already have it on their holiday TiVo schedule... right after the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving.

The interview is conducted by trash-publisher Judith Regan, who has proven herself to be a nightmarish, greedy, opportunistic harpy in the past, and solidifies her place in the Despicable Hall of Fame as she promotes Simpson's new book If I Did It, published by her company, ReganBooks and just happens to be owned by News Corporation, parent company of Fox.

And I just promoted it by reporting on this story.

Damn you Judith Regan!  Damn you all to Hell!!

Hello everyone... Nina here to present another installment of "Across the Pond," Dominique Taylor's semi-regular column focusing on the UK entertainment scene.  This week, Dominique opines on the talents of Lena Headey with the recent news that she has landed the role of Sarah Connor in the Fox network's Sarah Connor Chronicles...

Things Get Heady for Lena

By Dominique Taylor

As Nina has already mentioned, Lena Headey has landed the role as Sarah Connor in Fox’s new Terminator spin-off and so this week is dedicated to the Huddersfield girl who finally gets her break and asks the question, can she cut it?

Lina Heady has long been one of those actresses that you’re sure you’ve seen before but can’t really place.  Playing alongside Steve Coogan in The Parole Officer I remember mistaking her for Melanie Sykes.  And in similar Sykes fashion, she is a beautiful Northern brunette, but unlike Sykes, a midday ITV show with Des O’ Conner seems a million miles away as she is forging a solid career in Hollywood.

Solid because if you look at her filmography on IMDB, you will see that she has featured not only in Brothers Grimm, but also Onegin, Possession, Ripley’s Game and The Cave and she’s also got a number of films in pre and post-production, including Vivaldi and The Shooter.  However, the same website reminds us of her thus far over-shadowed talent by offering a biography that could fit on a postage stamp and giving priority to the fact she was born on the same day as Seann William Scott.  Flattering, no?

But can she blow this all into space as she lands the role of Sarah Connor?  Her role in The Cave saw her as an adrenaline junky mega bitch and she’s got the tattoos to butch herself up, but the thing that’s worrying me is that this is supposed to take place in the time between Terminator 2 and 3 and she doesn’t look a bit like Axl Rose.  Where’s the realism?  If this is going to work, I need to know why Sarah Connor decided the scraped-back hair, sunglasses and fag look was not for her.

All facetiousness aside, what I’m trying to get at is that, in usual fashion, James Cameron provided us with a heroine that was largely desexualised (other than the small matter of creating John) and Fox has swiftly sexed her up again.  I hope Lena does well, she deserves a steady starring role in the US, but I’m rather concerned this could just end up as one for the lads as a beautiful woman runs around firing her big gun and getting sweaty.

Lena Headey has been cast as the lead in The Sarah Connor Chronicles, which expands on the mythology of the Terminator films and takes place in the timeframe between Terminator 2: Judgement Day and Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, according to SciFiWire.

The project, from Warner Bros. TV is preparing a pilot for Fox, to be directed by David Nutter, who also directed James Cameron's Dark Angel pilot for the network.  Nutter also directed the pilots for Smallville, Without a Trace, and almost a dozen others that have all been picked up as full series orders.

"It's important for me to live up, as best I can, to the bar that Jim Cameron set," Nutter said back in August, adding that the pilot "has to carry as much of a punch" as possible, even on a TV budget.  "This is a huge project that's going to take an extensive amount of preparation and pre-production, [and I want to protect] the integrity of what Cameron created."

Headey will soon be seen opposite Gerard Butler in the feature film adaptation of Frank Miller's 300, where she will play Queen Gorgo.

Okay, I don't know how I missed this the other day, but it's worth talking about now, just in case some of you missed it too.

According to the Hollywood Reporter on Friday, Marvel Comics has partnered with CBS' Guiding Light daytime soap opera to produce an episode where a character gets zapped by electricity and then gains superpowers, including the ability to levitate and conduct electricity.

To top it off, Marvel will include an 8-page insert into some of its top titles where the heroes of the Marvel Universe descend upon the fictional town of GL's Springfield to determine if this new super-being is friend or foe.

Look for the episode, featuring Beth Ehler's Harley Davidson Cooper character to air this week, Wednesday, November 1st.

OMG.  I'm not sure I can do it.

I thought Fox's Arrested Development was simply brilliant.  While I love comedies like Seinfeld for their over-the-top gags and humor, Arrested Development to me was one of the funniest shows I have seen on TV for its outrageous subtlety, if that makes any sense.  Lines like "Buster, you're a grown man, you should be at home sleeping with your mother" are perfect examples of this.  Too bad it was cancelled.

The good news is Mitchell Hurwitz, creator and executive producer of the show, and Richard Day, a former writer on the show, are teaming up to adapt the BBC's The Thick of It, for American audiences according to the Hollywood Reporter.  Sony Pictures TV is currently shopping the idea around for the networks.

The BBC show centers on a "put-upon member of Parliament who is continually harassed by inept bureaucrats working for the prime minister and other politicians and civil servants."  It won the Best New Comedy trophy at the British Comedy Awards.

Perhaps some of our UK readers can fill us in?

Way back in April, Jenny From Canada reviewed the debut issue of Marvel's Moon Knight reboot.  She liked it, so she'll probably like this news...

Marvel Entertainment Inc. has announced that it will be bringing the adventures of Moon Knight to television with a live-action series, in conjunction with Larry Sugar of Vancouver-based No Equal Entertainment.

Moon Knight tells the story of Marc Spector, a soldier-of-fortune turned superhero after an encounter with the Egyptian God of Venegance and the moon god Konshu.  His first appearance was in the original Werewolf By Night series where his silver weapons inflicted their anti-lycanthropic effects on Jack Russell's lupine alter-ego. In his new series, Moon Knight is sort of a cross between Batman, Fox Mulder, and Karl Kolchak.

"'Moon Knight' has all the elements for an engaging television series. No Equal Entertainment has a real passion for the project and an amazing vision of how to bring the character and storyline to life that will appeal to action and sci-fi enthusiasts," said Marvel's David Maisel.

Sugar added, "We are delighted to be in business with Marvel Entertainment and believe that 'Moon Knight' will make a compelling and long-lasting television series."

Let's hope it does better than Blade.

Jane Wyatt, best known to science fiction fans as Amanda Grayson, Spock's mother on Star Trek, has died at age 95.  She passed away on Friday at her home in Bel Air, California from natural causes.

Wyatt was also known to classic film buffs as Sondra Bizet in 1937's Lost Horizon, her first major role.  After starring in dozens of films, she went on to television to star in Father Knows Best as Margaret Anderson, which earned her 3 Emmys.  Fans of NBC's St. Elsewhere remember her as Katherine Auschlander.

Wyatt's career suffered in the 1950s due to her opposition of Senator Joseph McCarthy, and retreated to the theater for a time, only to re-emerge on television in the 60s on a number of shows before landing the role of Amanda, which guaranteed her a place in pop culture history.

Wyatt took her role as the human mother to a half-Vulcan son seriously, and her appearance in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home as Amanda provided the focal point for the rebirth of Spock's character, providing the impetus for his more emotional, human side to assert itself in later story arcs, including his appearance on Star Trek: The Next Generation.

She is survived by sons Christopher and Michael Ward, from her 1935 marriage to investment banker Edgar Ward, who passed away in 2000.