Entertainment

Good news for Law & Order SVU Fans: Season 16 is Coming

There is great news for the Law & Order SVU fans. Their contract has been renewed and they have a 16th season that will come out and showcase on NBC.

A lot of thing have changed for SVU over the last couple of years. Chris Meloni left the show, and others joined the case. This has not affected the shows rating as it continues to be high. This was not an easy task to get another season to star on NBC. There were lengthy negotiations between NBC and the producer of the show Dick Wolf.
The Star of the show Mariska Hargitay is expected to return to the show for the 16th season. She is the only one that has been with the show since it first started. Actors have come and gone from the show, however Mariska Hargitay has been with the show since the beginning.

So how did the renewal come about? At first SVU was not on the list of renewals that came out in March. The reason for this was because the director of the show Wolf was asked to take a pay cut, in order for the show to be able to come back. Wolf was unwilling to do this. For a while it looked like the show was not going to come back and new episodes would not be filmed. The crew was so sure that this show was done that showruner Warren Leight was looking into other jobs. Once it became more apparent that the show was going to go on, Leight recommitted to another season with SVU. This would make the third series for Wolf to be renewed by NBC. Chicago Fire and Chicago PD had already been renewed. SVU would make the third one for Wolf. The show is averaging 8.4 million viewers. This is an increase from last season. Wolf would like to surpass Gunsmokes 20 seasons of renewals, and SVU might be the one to do it for him. SVU is the only one of the Law & Order series that is still in production. All of the other Law & Order series have already been cancelled.

So now SVU fans can look forward to another season of exciting drama. This series is a popular show on television with a lot of fans who enjoy the episodes. Whether or not this will be the last season for SVU is anyone’s guess. Hopefully the seasons will continue.

TV/Film

The Rise of the Television Super Hero

The last decade has seen a distinct interest in super heroes from movie-viewing audiences. Every company that has the rights to even a few super hero properties has been rushing to put out as many movies as they can in order to take advantage of all the money that’s flowing in that direction right now. Not every super hero property or comic title can generate the interest required for a studio to pick it up and spend lots of money to make a movie, however. For this reason, super heroes have begun migrating to the small screen and, despite smaller budgets and less prominent actors, they have been captivating television viewers everywhere.

The first of these properties to hit the airwaves was a show based on the DC hero, Green Arrow. Arrow had a rocky first season but managed to enthrall audiences enough that it was picked up for a second and then a third season. This was followed by a show from Marvel called Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. While this series brought in a lot of complaints during the majority of its first season, the final half-dozen episodes had audiences rethinking their criticism. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. was also renewed for a second season.

Given the success of these two properties, both Warner Bros. (the owners of the DC heroes) and Disney (the owners of The Avengers and those related properties) have rushed to fill a void that television executives never even realized existed. Fall of 2014 promises two DC series. The Flash will bring yet another popular hero to the small screen, building off of the character’s initial appearance in Arrow. Gotham is a show based on the world of Batman and will feature a look at the history of that comic book world by focusing on the character of James Gordon. Both shows have been picked up for a full season and have generated a lot of interest from the fans.

Disney is not to be outdone, however. While they don’t plan on releasing any shows via mainstream television channels, they do have a number of properties that will be showing up on Netflix. Starting in 2015, Marvel fans will be happy to see Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Iron First and Luke Cage all getting their own series. This will culminate in a Defenders mini-series, bringing all those characters together to form yet another Avengers-styled super team.

For fans that are not quite sold on all the super hero shows, there are plenty of other things popping up from lesser known sources. The Hellblazer comic series is in production under the title Constantine. War story fans will likely fall in love with the SyFy television adaptation of DMZ. The CW is picking up iZombie, a unique spin on the current zombie craze. Garth Ennis’ horrific and traumatic Preacher series is coming to AMC.

All-in-all, comic book fans are finally getting attention from the big production companies. For big explosions and epic storylines there are movies to watch. For those that like to tune in weekly and enjoy a slow walk through some excellent stories, television is the way to go. As long as these new shows continue to be successful, it is likely fans will see plenty more adaptations in the foreseeable future.

News

Celeb News: Beyonce and Solange

A video surfaced recently, that allegedly shows Beyonce’s sister, Solange, attacking Beyonce’s husband, Jay-Z, in an elevator. They were all in the elevator, leaving a Met Ball after party together. This family matter happened behind closed elevator doors, and if this had happened to any other person, they would have been allowed to deal with this family matter privately.

Instead, this video has become a media sensation, and has everyone wondering what caused the outburst. What happened between Jay-Z and Solange to cause her to attack him? We may never know the answer to that, but there is plenty of speculation and accusations being bantered about by others, not involved in the altercation.

What we do know, is that Solange’s Instagram account has been scrubbed clean of any pictures of her big sister, or any sisterly love between the two. A day after Solange’s account was cleared of pictures with her sister, Beyonce has made a gesture of sisterly love by filling her Instagram account with pictures of Solange and herself. Trying to smooth things over, and show her love for her sister, perhaps? Beyonce has been criticized for not intervening in the attack on the elevator. Posting the pictures is perhaps her way of extending the olive branch to her sister. None of the parties involved with, or that saw the altercation has commented publicly on the attack.

Beyonce and Jay-Z are very private about their lives, so this video gives others a window into their personal lives that they do not know much about. This kind of altercation caught on video simply fuels the media machine, and leaves people wondering what could have possibly happened to cause it. When public people are very private with their lives, any sort of story that gives a glimpse into their private lives, gets quite a bit of attention because people want to know more about it and them.

Only time will tell if we will find out the cause of this altercation. Maybe we will get some more pictures from Beyonce trying to reach out to her sister. Maybe they will just keep quiet about it, and hope that this bump in the road will go away and be forgotten. Let’s hope these two sisters can work out whatever their problems are, and get back to some of that sisterly love from Beyonce’s Instagram pictures.