A flip-flopping effort to rework 24 from torture porn into, well, anything else has delayed the show, possibly until January 2009. The last season ended in May.
One plan hatched by guilt-wracked writers was to have Jack Bauer bravely race against time in Africa to nurture orphans, build homes for poor people, dig ditches and make TV commercials with Sally Struthers. For some reason Fox execs didn't go for that.
Another idea, called "Bad Jack," was to have the show openly acknowledge and confront Jack's deep-seated and probably unforgivable moral and professional failings. Since this was the only option containing a shred of human decency, Fox brass logically turned it down.
The plan now is for Jack to go to Washington DC, where he will bravely race against time to "address head-on the accusations that his tactics were out of line," which probably means putting Nancy Pelosi in some kind of stress position or jumping to the aid of a liberal senator whose daughter and wife have conveniently been kidnapped and are about to be raped and what are you going to do now, lefty?? Also, there will be a hot lady character thinking about whether she wants to be a torturer like Jack.
The only remaining problem for 24 is that no one wants to work there:
Two actors declined roles due to moral objections. One Muslim actor turned down a job as a terrorist. Another actor, the former "thirtysomething" star Dave Clennon, was threatening to turn down a role as the senator who would interrogate Jack at the hearing... "At the end of the day, my sense of the show is that it promotes torture and I don't want to be a part of that," he says.
[WSJ]
 WZZM | Scandal tests mayor's survival skills DetNews.com - He is a survivor, emerging from the ashes of numerous scandals flashing his trademark smile. Rumors of strippers, questionable spending of taxpayer money, even a primary loss couldn't keep Kwame Kilpatrick down. Mayor ventures out today for first time since scandal broke Scandal not interfering with operations, Kilpatrick says |
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 Roanoke Times | 'Hannah Montana' In 3-D, Keeping It One-Dimensional Washington Post - By Adam Bernstein Fifteen lousy bucks for "Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert 3-D" and you still learn nothing about sucrose-charged sprite Cyrus and her rock-star alter ego. Even in a concert film, Montana/Cyrus is a hot ticket Some drove miles for Miley |
 KIDK | Ratings Fall, Pressure Grows in Writers Strike Wall Street Journal - By PETER SANDERS and SAM SCHECHNER As the Hollywood writers' strike nears the three-month mark, issues simmering for the past few weeks may finally be coming to a boil, pressuring the writers and the major studios to move toward a resolution. Recent Moves by Guild Leaders Rattle Writers’ Talks Network ratings slide as writers strike drags on |
 Boston Globe | "Eye" remake lacks quiet power of original Reuters - By Frank Scheck NEW YORK (Hollywood Reporter) - Considering that it ranks as one of the best of the J-horror films, it's surprising that it took this long for an American remake of the Pang brothers' 2002 "The Eye. The Eye Jessica Alba flick could use more blind terror |
 Javno.hr | Court gives Spears' father temporary conservatorship USA Today - LOS ANGELES (AP) - Britney Spears' father was named her temporary conservator, putting him in control of the pop star's welfare a day after she was taken to a psychiatric hospital. Britney Spears' daddy gains control Britney Spears Rushed To Hospital Again |
Britney Spears has unintentionally done Lindsay Lohan, and perhaps countless others, a good turn.
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Richard Hatch is still stuck on the island.
A federal appeals court in Boston upheld the "Survivor" winner's conviction on tax-evasion charges, further rejecting his claim that...* "There were, however, 50-plus-gallon trash bins for all the waste paper/crumpled up "copy paper," paper that has since vanished from the earth, think fey manila. The trash bins stood four feet high and everyone smoked and if you tossed a cigarette into the trash bin you could readily start a four-alarmer that would wipe out the city room. I was trying out for a job on the Bergen Record, making up a story—see, they did make them up—on a two-alarm fire in Hackensack, when a copy editor tossed a cigar into one of those trash bins and started a nice little copy-paper barbeque. I was offered the job but didn't take it. Even little bits of hilarity like that didn't make it worth working in Hackensack."
* "As a community service we offered tours to schools. One day, a group of school kids came through and they were pretty rowdy and dismissive of the reporters. Not to be outdone, we showed how childish we could be and starting throwing balled up chunks of paper at them as they left the office and headed to the composing room for the rest of their tour. Turns out that one of the kids in retaliation for our behavior stole our front page plate. The boys in composing figured that they couldn't have walked out with it because it was too big to hide under a jacket so it had to be hidden. They turned the place upside down but couldn't find it. Finally, they called the school and one of the kids fessed up and told us where he secreted it. The paper, which was an afternoon, was several hours late."
Xcaliber was early social-networking technology developed at Dartmouth College. In the heyday of Dungeons & Dragons, its vaguely Arthurian theme appealed to both hackers and preadolescents.All I can remember is IRC, so please share your stories of dorking out on pre-Internet technology!We evolved a whole cutesy shtick that, in this text-only interface, chiefly meant giving up mixed cases. In the name of enhancing adorableness, we stuck to little letters and as few spaces as English semantics could bear. Our classic squinched-up opener was "hi-howre you?"
At 13, Megan and I introduced our friends to the conference, and as early adapters she and I felt obliged to play the pros and make the whole thing look ungeeky. When someone on the network asked me what I was up to, I replied -- without fail -- "music, sports and parties," which was true, strictly speaking...
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No one else may understand why he has given Britney Spears his undivided attention, but manager Sam Lutfi hasn't given it a second thought.
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Eva Mendes is proving that not every star's battle with personal hardship is open for public consumption.
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Amy Winehouse's stay in rehab isn't just a drag--it's also a drip.
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