I am – Hercules!!


We’re in the home stretch on Los Angeles’ annual Museum of Television & Radio William S. Paley Festival.

The events celebrating “American Idol,” “The Office,” George Lucas, “Brothers & Sisters,” “The Closer,” “Dexter,” “Nip/Tuck” and “Prison Break” are behind us. Ahead still are “Ugly Betty,” “Jericho” and “The Simpsons.”

Here’s a bit of scoop from Saturday night’s “Heroes” presentation from "Mark Collins":

Straight from the HEROS panel at Paleyfest in Hollywood. They showed a scene from the next new batch of Heros eps.****SPOILER WARNING*********. Linderman is explaining that he is responsible for the nuke explosion to come in NYC, and that the reason is the resultant crisis will unite the rest of the world! He alludes to having a power, being part of a earlier group who were doing good deeds, but later fell apart; some of them becoming the cabal we've seen so far. He also feels he's doing the world a favor. Of course, this is Ozmandius' reason for the faked NYC alien attack & a-bomb in Watchmen. Can all of the Heros writers not be aware of this major plot point from Watchmen? And, If that film ever gets made, would it force them to change the ending, since Heros has now used the same idea? Hayden P, by the way, looked amazing, and was very funny throughout, as they all were. (almost everyone was there except Ando & Syler.) What do you think?

I think I'll reserve judgment until somebody trots out a giant telepathic squid.

If you’re headed to the “Simpsons” Paley event on Thursday, I hope you ask Matt Groening what his role is on the show. He shares teleplay credit with the great Sam Simon on two season-one episodes and a solo credit on one season-three episode. Since then, nothing on seasons four through nine.

“Simpsons” writer Mike Reiss is alleged to have told a crowd at Villanova University in 2001 that Groening really never had much to do with the show. Groening disputes this, but has not always been terribly specific on what he’s contributed since his lone solo season-three episode, “Colonel Homer.”

At an MT&R “Simpsons” event held many years ago, Groening was asked what he did on “The Simpsons,” but I seem to remember he deflected the question, choosing only to thank the many people involved with the show’s creation. Maybe we’ll get more this time around.

Find more on the Paley fest here.

Purchase Paley tickets via Ticketmaster here.

Past Paley For Sale!!

$19.95 Paley Festival: “Boston Legal”
$19.95 Paley Festival: “Desperate Housewives”
$19.95 Paley Festival: “Lost”

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