Some theories about the rest of "Game of Thrones" Season Six

Now that David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have publicly announced a general timeline for the end of Game of Thrones - two shortened seasons after the current sixth season, totaling about 13 episodes - it's time to get speculating. Over halfway through season six, the pieces of the endgame are starting to move into place, and as a result I'm feeling pretty confident about the following prediction for the final four episodes of this season, and the series overall. (SPOILER WARNING, obviously.)

Of "space Gandalfs" and sassy redheads

To celebrate Matt Smith's tenure as the Doctor, which will be coming to an end after this year's Christmas special, here's a pretty great deleted scene from the fifth season's "Flesh and Stone" where Eleven describes himself in Tolkien-esque terms. (It's also a great pick-me-up if you're still sad about Game of Thrones.)



This deleted scene is fun and entertaining, despite the fact that it reminds me of that awful time when Amy was trying to hook up with the Doctor. However, it also reminds me of the reason I so loved the second-greatest sassy redhead to ever grace the TARDIS: she is constantly calling the Doctor on his shit. (As did the greatest sassy redhead to travel with Space Gandalf, Donna Noble. I miss you every day, Donna.) After all, someone occasionally needs to point out the Doctor's propensity for traveling with young, hot girls and only young, hot girls.

I'm not too sad about Smith's departure yet; we still have two episodes to go before we have to bid farewell to Eleven. But I know that when the time comes I'll miss his antic energy, his awkward attempts to mimic human behavior, and the sadness and rage and fear that are just barely balanced by love and optimism. Even so, I'll be excited to see what the future brings; after all, I thought no one could ever match David Tennant, and Smith's fantastic performance proved me wrong time and time again. In the meantime, we have "The Name of the Doctor" and the reappearance of Ten and Rose Tyler (at least) to look forward to. Personally, I'm hoping for a Donna Noble cameo.

Game of Thrones recap: it's tough to be a Stark

A shocking, brutal, brilliant episode makes sure everyone knows just how far Westeros' noblest family has fallen.

Robb (Richard Madden), Catelyn (Michelle Fairley) and Talisa (Oona Chaplin) prepare for a wedding.

You're almost there, and you're afraid you won't make it. The closer you get, the worse the fear gets.

-Sandor Clegane

"The Rains of Castamere" was an episode full of near misses and narrow escapes. Bran wargs into Summer's mind at the last possible moment and beats back the Wildlings. Jon reveals himself as a member of the Night's Watch and barely escapes from the people he just betrayed. Jorah, Grey Worm and Daario Naharis end one scene facing seemingly impossible odds in Yunkai, and begin the next telling Daenerys that they successfully sacked the city. Jon and Bran pass within yards of each other but never make contact. And Arya comes painfully, achingly close to being reunited with her mother and brother, only to have any hope of happiness torn from her grasp.

I had suspected for quite a while that things were going to end badly for Robb. So much of season 3 (and a lot of season 2, really) has been about pushing the King in the North into a corner. His doom was basically sealed once he married Talisa and his mother set Jaime free, and the events of this season have done nothing but back up that hunch, from the loss of the Karstarks to his final, desperate plan to take Casterley Rock from the Lannisters. Robb was hemmed in on all sides, losing supporters because of his marriage to Talisa and the execution of Lord Karstark. On top of that, he was actually happy in his marriage and expecting a child, which is never a good sign in Westeros.

Game of Thrones recap: the only thing that matters is the climb

An intense, revealing scene (and a viscerally horrifying visual) cuts to the heart of Game of Thrones' central power conflicts.

Aiden Gillen as Petyr Baelish and Conleth Hill as Lord Varys.

Honestly, I had a really hard time picking a scene to analyze this week. There were a lot of great moments in "The Climb": Lady Oleanna faced off with Tywin Lannister, Cersei and Tyrion actually showed one another some affection, and Jon and Ygritte engaged in some pulse-pounding mountaineering. In the end, though, I had to go with my gut and choose Littlefinger's tense, complex scene with Varys, purely because it contained the single image that stayed with me long after the closing credits had faded out: Ros's arrow-ridden corpse, tied to Joffrey's bed after Baelish decided that she was nothing more than a bad investment.

In Vulture's recap of "The Climb," Nina Shen Rastogi expresses her disgust with the tossed-off nature of Ros's death. Her reaction is something I completely understand: the fact that Littlefinger, who I'm beginning to suspect is as heartless as Joffrey (if not quite as twisted) ends Ros's life without so much as a second thought is bad enough. That he hands her over to Joffrey for what he knows will be the worst possible death is horrifying. And that he drops the fact casually into conversation, as an attempt to throw Varys off his game, is absolutely sickening.

Why Happy Endings should have let Penny marry Pete

By returning to the status quo, the show once again reduced Penny's identity to that of a single girl, making a fool of herself for men.

Casey Wilson as Penny and Nick Zano as Pete.

I always assumed that Penny and Pete weren't actually going to end up married. Happy Endings is a show where character evolution happens extremely slowly, if it happens at all; Penny wasn't going to change overnight from an insecure single girl to a happily married woman in a stable relationship. And since Penny and Pete's breakup was inevitable, I'm glad it happened in the relatively low-key setting of "She Got Game Night," as opposed to the traditional disastrous wedding episode, which would have just rehashed the events of the show's pilot.

Still, though, I really wish Penny and Pete had actually gotten married. Partially this is because I enjoyed Nick Zano's presence, which offered a laid-back counterpoint to the general insanity of the Happy Endings gang. Mostly, though, I like that Penny and Pete's relationship allowed Penny to break out of the desperate-single-girl role that has defined her character throughout the show's three seasons.

Game of Thrones recap: it's hard to be the Kingslayer

Characters (literally and figuratively) expose their secrets in the low-key, but still plenty compelling, "Kissed By Fire."

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as Jaime Lannister (don't call him Kingslayer).

For a show so heavy on battles, beheadings and dragon fire, Game of Thrones has always featured a substantial amount of talking. There's a lot of backstory to be gotten to on this show, to the point where there have been entire episodes - most notably the first season installment "Cripples, Bastards and Broken Things" - that are almost entirely composed of people giving speeches. It's something, then, to say that Jaime's speech to Brienne in "Kissed By Fire" is one of the finest, most compelling, most revealing and most emotional speeches anyone on the show has ever given.

Jaime has spent the season becoming a more sympathetic character, to the point where it's (almost) possible to forget about that time he pushed Bran out the window because the boy saw him having incestuous sex with Cersei. One of the reasons Jaime is now so much more identifiable is that he personifies the difficulties of staying the honorable course, or even figuring out just what the honorable course is. After all, the man was despised by Westeros' resident honorable man, Ned Stark, for killing the man who executed Ned's father and brothers, because Jaime was, at the time, a sworn member of Aerys Targaryen's King's Guard.

Game of Thrones recap: how do you say "badass" in Valyrian?

Daenerys Targaryen upends the balance of power in one of the most thrilling scenes the show has ever done.

Emilia Clarke as Daenerys Targaryen.

Daenerys Targaryen was one of the most compelling characters in Game of Thrones first season. She started out as a frightened girl, sold in marriage by her odious brother in exchange for an army, and ended the season as a Khaleesi (of a very small, somewhat ragged group, but still a Khaleesi) and a Mother of Dragons. Her journey was compelling, her story had tons of potential, and Emilia Clarke gave one of the best performances on a series full of them.

Then season two happened. Dany spent ten episodes in Qarth, in a holding pattern where she tried to find the money to invade Westeros and yelled about her dragons. The surreal finale sequence in the House of the Undying helped bring some actions back to her story, but it was clear that, when it came to Daenerys Stormborn of the House Targaryen, the show was spinning its wheels.

But no more! The final scene of this week's episode, "And Now His Watch Has Ended," was a masterfully constructed thrill, and Dany finally took her place as the badass powerhouse we all knew she could be. The sack of Astapor solidified the Khaleesi's place as an unquestioned ruler - I don't think Ser Jorah or Barristan Selmy had a single line of dialogue this week - and upended the balance of power in Westeros. If I were a Lannister, a Stark, a Baratheon or a Tyrell, and I heard that the last Targaryen was marching at the head of an 8000-strong army, not to mention in possession of three dragons, I would be very, very afraid.

Game of Thrones recap: the trials of Sansa Stark

Sansa opens up to Margaery and Lady Oleanna about the true nature of Joffrey Baratheon in a funny, tense and heartbreaking scene.

Sophie Turner as Sansa Stark.

Honestly, I'm tired of the Game of Thrones photo recaps. They were fun for a while, but eventually just turned into me making lists of things I liked about each episode, and that's fairly boring for everyone involved. So, starting today with "Dark Wings, Dark Words," I'm going to try a different approach: each week, I'll choose a scene that was particularly interesting, illuminating or memorable, and break it down for you all, both on its own and as it ties into the episode as a whole.

The stand-out scene from last night's episode featured both the whip-smart Margaery Tyrell (Natalie Dormer) and the introduction of the amazing Lady Oleanna (played by the equally wonderful Diana Rigg), yet the moment was really about poor, trapped, terrified Sansa Stark. From the moment Lady Oleanna asks Sansa to tell her the truth about Joffrey, it's clear from the girl's stuttering, timid response that she is about to crumble. The mere fact of Oleanna and Margaery's kindness makes Sansa drop her guard completely, pouring out her heart to these two women and telling them that Joffrey is "a monster."

Game of Thrones photo recap: "Valar Dohaeris"

Game of Thrones is back, baby! "Valar Dohaeris" was a little scattered - there were a lot of characters to catch up with, after all - but it hit all of our favorite GoT notes: complex power machinations, gratuitous nudity, disturbing violence, direwolves and dragons. So without further ado, here are the best moments and most memorable lines from "Valar Dohaeris."



"I want to fight for the side that fights for the living." Question for Jon: who wants to fight for the dead?

"They said you'd lost your nose, but it's not as gruesome as all that." A cute nod to the books, where Tyrion does, in fact, lose his nose in the Battle of Blackwater. Luckily for those of us who love Peter Dinklage's face, CGI-ing his nose away in every frame was probably not in the budget.

"Grand Maester Pycelle made the same joke. You must be proud to be as funny as a man whose balls brush his knees." Tyrion Lannister: scarred, but still hilarious.

"I don't even know how much I'm paying you now." "Which means you can afford it." Bronn and Tyrion, together again. All is right with the world.

"You are an ill-made, spiteful little creature full of envy, lust and low cunning. Men's laws give you the right to bear my name and display my colors since I cannot prove that you are not mine. To teach me humility, the gods have condemned me to watch you waddle about wearing that proud lion that was my father's sigil and his father's before him. But neither gods nor men will ever compel me to let you turn Casterley Rock into your whorehouse. Go, now. Speak no more of your rights to Casterley Rock." Tywin's cruelty and rage in this scene are something to behold. It's painful to watch, particularly when the camera cuts to Tyrion, but Charles Dance is magnificent as always.

"Watch out for her." "I always do." "Watch out for her with him." My bet for the season is that Sansa ends up married to Littlefinger. Which would probably be marginally more pleasant than being married to Joffrey, but is still gross, particularly when you factor in Littlefinger's obsession with her mother.

"Don't despair, Ser Davos. What I told your son is true. Death by fire is the purest death." Melisandre is one cold-hearted bitch.

"My mother's always had a penchant for drama. Facts become less and less important to her as she grows older." The cut to Cersei when Joffrey says the word "older" is a thing of beauty. Lena Headey's glare could cut stone.

"Tell this ignorant whore of a Westerner to open her eyes and watch." "He begs you attend this carefully, your grace." Again, the interplay between the slave seller and his interpreter is both funny and, once you figure out that the girl is herself a slave, rather frightening.

The Doctor is back, with a new companion and new threats

Doctor Who's return features the third incarnation of Clara Oswald, the reappearance of an old villain, and a dose of internet-age paranoia.

Jenna-Louise Coleman and Matt Smith in "The Bells of Saint John." Photo courtesy of telegraph.co.uk.

There is one genuinely horrifying moment in "The Bells of Saint John," the first episode of this half-season of Doctor Who. At the end of the hour, Miss Kizlet (Celia Imrie), who is working for the Great Intelligence (who originally appeared way back in the era of the Second Doctor, and who returned as the villain behind the evil snowmen in this year's Christmas special) is abandoned by the Intelligence and told to erase knowledge of the Intelligence's existence from the minds of herself and her staff. In a wickedly clever, creepy image, Kizlet hits a "Restore Factory Settings" command on the iPad app she's been using to run the operation, leaving behind a room full of suddenly bewildered employees who have no idea how they got there. It's a funny stinger that turns tragic when the UNIT troops sent to assess the situation bust into her office, only to find the formerly powerful woman reduced to the intellectual level of a child who can't find her parents. The Intelligence has discarded her, just as it discarded Dr. Simeon (Richard E. Grant), whose face and voice it now uses to communicate (apparently the show couldn't afford to retain Ian McKellen), in "The Snowmen," and the moment is sad and disturbing in equal measure.

The rest of "The Bells of Saint John" stays away from this kind of harrowing emotion, which is probably best for those of us still recovering from the events of "The Angels Take Manhattan." It's a generally light-hearted episode that serves primarily to re-introduce the audience to Jenna-Louise Coleman's new companion, Clara Oswald, and to establish Clara's relationship with the Doctor. The episode's actual plot, which involves uploading people's souls into the WiFi as food (or possibly pets) for the Great Intelligence, takes a backseat to the Doctor/Clara dynamic; the threat never seems terribly credible, and mostly serves as a platform for lots of Facebook and Twitter jokes. Not that I have a problem with these jokes; the way Matt Smith contemptuously enunciates "Twitter" is, and always has been, marvelous, and the scene in which Kizlet's second-in-command, Mahler (Robert Whitlock) realizes that every employee of their super-secret operation has posted their work information on Facebook is a brilliant little piece of comedy.

But is it "real" enough? Girls, The Wire and the authenticity obsession

Thinking about pop culture in terms of perceived authenticity can help explain reactions to everything from Girls to The Wire to Jennifer Lawrence and Anne Hathaway.

Lena Dunham, creator and star of Girls; David Simon, creator of The Wire.

Steven Poole's recent, excellent piece on the authenticity fetish currently dominating the culture (published in The New Statesman) has some fascinating things to say about the way critics and the public at large value authenticity in their entertainment. Touching on reactions to Zero Dark Thirty, artisanal coffee shops and Beyonce's performance of the national anthem, Poole ultimately concludes that the search for authenticity in entertainment and consumer goods is a way for tastemakers to distinguish themselves from the huddled masses who enjoy such "inauthentic" entertainments as lip-synched performances and Argo:

The authenticity of such an aspirational brand’s product boils down to the promise that numberless faceless artisans have laboured personally on your behalf. A similar fantasy underlies the ferocious insistence that a coffee shop be “artisanal” and “independent”, the indolent demand for a pre-aged Stratocaster, or the hysterical suspicion that a singer might not have been working hard enough to entertain us. The self-appointed guardians of authenticity, it seems, want desperately to believe that they are at the top of the labour pyramid. In cultural markets that are all too disappointingly accessible to the masses, the authenticity fetish disguises and renders socially acceptable a raw hunger for hierarchy and power.

 Of course, if you have a friend who prides himself on his consumption of only locally-grown, hand-picked food and micro-financed films shot on a vintage Super-8 camera (or if, god forbid, you are that friend), you were probably already aware of this phenomenon. Still, Poole's essay (which I highly encourage everyone to read - it meanders into existentialism a bit in the middle, talking about Sartre and "bad faith" and still manages to be worth your time) offers a useful starting point for a pop-culture discussion I've been wanting to have for a while, about perceived "realism" on film and television and the (often insane) reactions to that realism.

Game of Thrones season 3: who will live, who will die?

In preparation for the epic series' third season, I present a speculative list of the characters most likely to die, and those who stand the greatest chance of surviving the next ten episodes.

Emilia Clarke as Daenerys Targaryen; Michelle Fairley as Catelyn Stark

Game of Thrones has gained a reputation as a TV series that doesn't think twice about killing major characters, even when those characters happen to be the lead who was featured in all the promotional materials. The show's "no one is safe" sensibility makes it difficult (and irresistibly tempting) to predict who will be the next casualty. So just for fun, as a newbie who is unfamiliar with the books and therefore blissfully ignorant of the show's next painful twist, I offer up a list of the five characters most likely to follow Ned Stark into the next world, and the five who have the best shot of telling death, "Not today."

The Casualties

5. Petyr "Littlefinger" Baelish (Aiden Gillan)

King's Landing's very own Tommy Carcetti might seem like the consummate survivor; after all, he's the third-smartest character on the show (after Lord Varys and Tyrion), he's demonstrated his craftiness on multiple occasions, and he's always willing to double-cross the losing side (a.k.a., the dearly departed Ned Stark). However, Littlefinger's downfall might be his lust for power. While Lord Varys always manages to keep his ambition in check, Baelish is the sort to be cut down while reaching for the crown. Not to mention that he's now the Lord of Harrenhall, and that locale has never been kind to its owners.

4. Ser Jorah Mormont (Iain Glen)

Now that Dany has a ship (not to mention some rapidly growing dragons), it seems that her return to Westeros is, if not exactly imminent, at least plausibly on the horizon. In spite of (or, rather, because of) Ser Jorah's love and loyalty when it comes to his Khaleesi, I don't see him ever making it back to Westeros. Love and loyalty are not the sorts of qualities that tend to get rewarded on Game of Thrones. Plus, back in Qarth, we met a cryptic masked woman who suggested that Ser Jorah may have betrayed the woman he loves. All signs point to an unhappy ending for Dany's white knight.

The six most awesome moments from Game of Thrones' third-season trailer

The trailer for Game of Thrones' third season is finally here, and boy is it amazing!



In no particular order, here are the six most awesome things contained in this clip:

• Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) standing in front of (commanding?) a giant army. Time for the Mother of Dragons to do some serious ass-kicking.
• Catelyn's (Michelle Fairley) line, "Show them how it feels to lose what they love." Season 3 is looking to be the season the ladies of GoT really get their bad-ass on.
• Joffrey's (Jack Gleeson) line, "Everyone is mine to torment." It's nice to know that the show's most villainous villain has only gotten more evil over the hiatus. Everyone needs someone to hate, and that someone is Joffrey Baratheon.
• "I'm going to light the biggest fire the North has ever seen!" Who else is excited for the introduction of Ciaran Hind's Mance Rayder?
• The dragons are growing! And flying! And possibly lighting a whole bunch of shit on fire!
• MS MR's awesome "Bones," which scores the trailer and which is my new favorite song. Between this and last year's epic "War is Coming" clip, which featured Florence + The Machine's "Seven Devils," I almost wish GoT used anachronistic pop music to score actual episodes (the key word being "almost").

UPDATE: There is now an extended version of the Season 3 trailer, and it is somehow even more badass than the first. Probably because of the dramatically increased presence of Tyrion (Peter Dinklage), whose fall from grace at the end of the second season has done nothing to diminish his quips.

THAT Scene: how Castle betrayed its main character (and the audience)

When Richard Castle (Nathan Fillion) tortures an injured man for information, it sells out the character in the name of plot momentum.

THAT Scene is a recurring feature that takes a closer look at a single scene that exemplifies a particular show, theme or moment in time. The scene might be good or bad, but it will always be memorable and worth talking about.

When judged alongside other serious Castle episodes (for the record, the worst kind of Castle episodes), "Target," the first half of the Alexis-gets-kidnapped two-parter that ends tonight with "Hunt," is actually pretty solid. The hour does a good job of building to the reveal that Alexis (Molly Quinn) is missing, first by playing Castle's increasing paranoia over the Columbia-set mystery for laughs, then having Castle and Beckett discover that Alexis was with Sara El-Masri (Karen David) the night she went missing, and finally revealing that Castle's daughter was the kidnappers' second victim. It was also a good episode for Alexis, who has been increasingly grating as of late; Quinn did a great job leaving behind the character's neuroses and showing that she can be calm and collected under pressure while remaining vulnerable. Plus, we got a surprisingly detailed and accurate depiction of how to pick a lock in the bargain!

One incredibly jarring moment, however, nearly soured the whole experience for me. After finding the injured driver of the kidnappers' getaway vehicle in a local hospital, Beckett (Stana Katic) and Castle (whose presence at the interrogation of a man involved in his daughter's kidnapping would bother me more if it weren't consistent with Castle's usual blatant disregard for actual police procedure) try to get the man to tell them where Alexis and Sara are being held. After an immunity offer fails to entice, Castle asks Beckett to give him a moment alone with the man. We see Castle threaten the suspect, and then cut to Beckett outside, as we hear the injured man scream. A moment later, Castle emerges with the address of a farmhouse north of New York City.

Community celebrates its (apparently real) return!

Will Community actually return on February 7 as NBC has promised us, or will this be another October 19 situation? (By the way, NBC, thanks for totally ruining by birthday by cruelly yanking my Community away!) Only time will tell, but this epic Steve Porter remix of moments from the show's third season is good news.



You tried to destroy Community, NBC, but you only made it... MORE AWESOME!

EW.com re-imagines Game of Thrones as a CW-style soap opera

As part of the magazine's year-end round-up of the best and worst everything in pop culture, Entertainment Weekly created a clever promo for Game of Thrones, if the epic aired not on HBO but on the CW.



While highlighting the pairings of Ygritte and Jon Snow and Daenerys and Ser Jorah was the obvious way to go, I quite enjoyed the way EW took advantage of the excellent chemistry between Peter Dinklage and Conleth Hill to imply a somewhat plausible romance between Tyrion and Varys. Plus, the Tyrion/Varys (Varion? Tyrys?) pairing would leave the door open for an excellent love triangle between the Imp, the Spider and poor, loyal, left-out Bronn. Spin-off series, anyone?

The Girls season 2 trailer is here

The sophomore season of Lena Dunham's much-discussed series is heavy on the Shoshanna (yay!), but generally lacking in Donald Glover.

Zosia Mamet and Alex Karpovsky of Girls.

I had something of a complicated relationship with the first season of HBO's Girls. (Of course, given the endless discussion that surrounded the series, having an uncomplicated relationship with the show would have been almost impossible). The series got better and funnier as the first season came to a close, but I still had some real issues with the way Dunham portrayed issues of sex and relationships among twenty-somethings, issues that kept me from ever fully connecting with the titular girls and their many awkward and hilarious problems.

The just-released trailer for the second season, however, got me excited for Girls' return by smartly emphasizing the comedy and allowing the audience to laugh at Hannah and her friends' often unrealistic expectations and world-views. Plus, it highlights the series' greatest asset: Zosia Mamet, whose Shoshanna was the funniest, most likeable and most criminally underused character of the first season.

The trailer demonstrates a couple of notable blindspots: Shoshanna and Ray telling Marnie (Allison Williams) that she's pretty, but not beautiful enough to be a model, rings false to anyone with eyes, and the blink-and-you-missed-it appearance by Donald Glover doesn't do much to generate excitement over  the Community favorite and actual non-white person making an appearance on a show that came under so much scrutiny for its lily-white cast.

However, these two misses are made up for by the myriad of funny lines and mocking character insights that the clip dishes up. From Adam's (Adam Driver) incredibly creepy song and stalker-y text messages, to the sight of Shoshanna and Ray repeatedly getting it on, to Marnie's oblivious self-obsession and the zen veneer Jessa (Jemima Kirke) uses to mask her naivete about her marriage to Thomas-John (Chris O'Dowd), there's a lot of promise in this two-minute spot. Now we'll just see if the second season can live up to it.

The best lines and moments from the Girls trailer:

• Seriously, how hilariously creepy is Adam's break-up song?
• "This is what happens when you break up with a sociopath." Truer words, Hannah, have never been spoken.
• "You tend to overthink things, and that's an issue for you." On the one hand, overthinking things is definitely an issue for Hannah. On the other hand, Jessa married a smarmy investment banker without even knowing his address.
• "And I know that I always said he was murdery in a sexy way, but what if he's murdery in like a murder way?" Adam does have a kind of charismatic serial-killer vibe to him.
• The re-appearance of The Lonely Island's Jorma Taccone as a sexually aggressive artist is as improbable as it is funny.
• "What are you wearing?" "Oh, a shirt!" It's mostly Dunham's inflection on the last line, not to mention her absurd neon mesh tank top, that sells this one.

The official World War Z trailer finally debuts

The zombie action in the Brad Pitt-starring adaptation of Max Brooks' novel looks great, but the clip ignores the geopolitical savvy that made the book so compelling.

After years of reports on the embattled production of World War Z - which has been plagued by so many obstacles, including illegal weapons caches, fluctuating release dates, and about a thousand different writers being brought in to retool the script - the trailer for the film (directed by Marc Forster, produced by and starring Brad Pitt) is finally here. And, not going to lie, it's pretty cool.



Awesome shots of massed zombies crawling up a wall like flesh-eating insects aside, however, the trailer does nothing to dispel the serious doubts I have about the adaptation's ability to capture the novel's greatest strength: the terrifying realism of the ways various governments respond to the threat of the zombie apocalypse. (Major SPOILERS for those who haven't read the book). World War Z is as much about social upheaval and foreign policy as it is about the actual zombies, and one of the best parts of the book is reading about individual nations' reactions to the end of the world, from Israel instituting border checkpoints where guards threaten to shoot infected persons on site, to French citizens taking refuge in the labyrinthine Paris sewers, to the United States military worrying more about the effectiveness of their photo-ops than their zombie-killing strategy.

Of course, a two-minute trailer would never be able to capture the complex political machinations that drive so much of Brook's novel. And the book's format - a series of interviews with dozens of unrelated characters, only a few of whom show up more than once - would be incredibly difficult to adapt into anything resembling an action-packed zombie film. (If only Steven Soderbergh hadn't already made Contagion; that film's multiple narratives, geopolitical intelligence and heartfelt character moments would have been perfect for World War Z). However, the trailer's focus on Pitt's apparent heroism - driven, of course, by love of his wife (Mireille Enos) and two adorable daughters - makes the film look like a fairly generic disaster narrative, where the book was anything but.

None of this is to suggest that I won't be buying a ticket when the movie comes out: after all, trailers are often misrepresentations of the films they're advertising, and that final shot of the massed zombies swarming up a seemingly impenetrable barrier is pure nightmare fuel. In order to really do justice to Brooks' book, however, World War Z will have to move beyond the simple disaster-movie narrative and do something much more difficult; convince viewers that what they're watching is not a mere story about the end of the world, but a documentary. And it will have to do all that while maintaining the unrealistic fiction that zombies would, in fact, be fast rather than shambling.

The Rising Profile of Leslie Odom Jr.

The Smash star and self-proclaimed blue-collar actor tells guest blogger Eva Mckend about enjoying his time in the spotlight and exceeding his own expectations.

Leslie Odom Jr.

By Eva McKend

Seventeen years ago, the musical RENT found its way into Leslie Odom Jr.’s living room. The actor can’t recall if he saw it on 20/20 or another news program, but what he does remember is walking into the now defunct HMV store in his hometown of Philadelphia. Odom had to track down the music.

Soon after, the 13-year-old came up with a plan. He would work on his acting, singing and dancing until he was 30, get a role in the musical and perform in the show for at least ten years.

But the young Odom’s dreams came faster than he ever envisioned when he nabbed a spot in the production’s chorus four years later.

“RENT really gave me the confidence to pursue this [acting] with my whole heart. It changed my life when it came into my living room and when I stepped on the Broadway stage,” he explained in an exclusive sit-down interview with Pencils Down, Pass the Remote in New York’s Bryant Park.

It was this early confirmation he would get once again at twenty-two after graduating from Carnegie Mellon’s School of Drama. Odom landed a role on CSI: Miami within 48 hours of moving to California. His friend had to drive him to the shoot—Odom didn’t have a car.

“I went to LA with fifteen hundred dollars and a dream. The question was, am I going to get out there and not have a ticket home. I prayed about it,” said Odom.

Steven Moffat, Amelia Pond, and the Complexities of Doctor Who

"The Angels Take Manhattan" is the culmination of Moffat's delve into the Doctor's decidedly destructive tendencies.

Caitlin Blackwood as the young Amelia Pond in "Let's Kill Hitler."

There's a definite philosophical dividing line between the Russell T. Davies/Christopher Eccleston/David Tennant era of Doctor Who and the Steven Moffat/Matt Smith seasons. That difference began, sneakily, to manifest itself in the very first Moffat/Smith episode, "The Eleventh Hour," but it didn't really come to the fore until the sixth and (currently airing, pretty fantastic) seventh seasons. This underlying change in philosophies mostly concerns the way the show treats its central character, 1200-year-old time-traveling adventurer The Doctor, and the effect that he has on the people who travel with him, fight with him, and love him.

Davies' Doctor, as embodied by Eccleston and Tennant, is (almost) never anything less than a full-on hero. There are moments when the show acknowledges his destructive impact, sure - Donna has to save the Tenth Doctor from his own rage when he drowns the Racnoss queen, and he power-trips when trying to change a fixed moment in time in "The Waters of Mars" - but, all in all, the Davies-era series shied away from taking a hard look at the tensions between the good intentions of its hero and the broken people left in his wake.