Hollywood Reporter says that actor Rick Worthy, who played Cylon Simon in Battlestar Galactica may be headed over to Heroes for the new season. Worthy is in talks to play Greg Grunberg’s new partner.

Worthy comes from a long line of scifi projects. He was Jannar on Enterprise, and he guested on Deep Space Nine, Voyager, Fallen, and he had a pivitol role in the series finale of Dark Angel. Without checking IMDB — can you name the character he played?

Photo: Mar 16, 2009 - New York, New York, USA - Actor RICK WORTHY at the New York premiere of ‘Duplicity’ held at the Ziegfeld Theater

Newscom

“Just hired Javier Grillo-Marxuach, Erik Oleson, and Angela Kang as writers on DAY ONE! More announcements soon!”

– Jesse Alexander via Twitter

Day One is NBC’s new apocalyptal aftermath series helmed by Heroes and Lost producer Jesse Alexander.

The story follows a band of eclectic neighbors from the same apartment building in Los Angeles who are forced to ban together in order to survive. Now they’ve got some hefty talent backing them up in the form of Javier Grillo-Marxuach (seen here with his friends from Lost) the creative genius behind the underrated Middleman series along with Erik Oleson from E-Ring and The Agency. Sounds like this show’s survival chances just went up a notch.

And speaking of The Middleman, Grillo-Marxuach announced on his blog that the DVD would be ready for release sometime this summer. If you’re a fan, and you really should be, check out the Shout! Factory website for the evolution of the DVD cover art. It’s all good stuff.

Photo: William Mapother, Mira Furlan, Jorge Garcia and Javier Grillo-Marxuach attend the Official “Lost” Fan Convention held at the Burbank Airport Hilton and Towers in Burbank, California on June 11, 2005 (Pictured:William Mapother, Mira Furlan, Jorge Garcia, Javier Grillo-Marxuach). Photo By Baxter/ABACA.

Source: Newscom

Could Harry Potter beat Neo at a fight?
Is Tatooine a harsher place to live than Middle Earth?
Captain Kirk vs Captain Jack Sparrow — you decide.

It’s these kinds of questions that keep Heroes’ star Milo Ventimiglia (seen here with a furry friend at the Fanboys premire) up at night and now he’s found an outlet! Milo and his team at DiVide Pictures are teaming up with Agility Studios to produce Ultradome, a tongue-in-cheek, short-format digital video series that taps into the comic book, video game, action-adventure, fantasy and science-fiction culture.

Each episode begins with two characters involved in a heated pop-culture debate (shades of The Big Bang Theory) when suddenly they’re transported to the Ultradome to battle it out with weapons and magics taken from the worlds they’ve been arguing about.

Lightsabers against Harry Potter’s wand? A phaser up against Wonder Woman’s golden lasso? Nothing is off limits inside the Ultradome - and creative and casting possibilities are endless, as Ventimiglia and Agility plan to use connections to sci-fi enthusiast actors, writers and directors to build a bevy of high-profile cameos and cinematic visual effects.

“My whole life has been spent engaged with friends in intellectual debate . like whether Kirk is tougher than Spock or if Middle Earth is a more difficult place to live than Tatooine. With Ultradome, we can bring these debates to the public and settle them in the most logical way possible: through armed combat,” said Ventimiglia. “We’re very excited to be working with Agility on this series and to tap into their expertise in digital programming.”

The Ultradome pilot episode, “Star Wars vs. Lord of the Rings,” is currently in post-production, and additional episodes are slated to follow.

Photo: PRPhotos

Peacock network execs have said all along Heroes was never in any danger, despite flagging ratings. They’ve now made it official, as they continue their trend of announcing their plans two weeks before the other networks pitch shows to advertisers.

NBC will wait two weeks to announce the scheduling for its shows, so we’ll be waiting to see if Heroes remains on Monday nights. And if so, what shows will share that night with it. The Christian Slater spy vehicle My Own Worst Enemy was NBC’s big plan for Monday nights last season but it quickly vanished. Combined with Heroes’ well-documented problems and Mondays haven’t exactly been sunshine and lollipops.

Jay Leno will take care of the 10 p.m. hour on Mondays and the rest of the primetime week. That will leave potential pilots with precious few primetime hours to scrap over.  The drama behind the scenes at NBC is even better than the stuff in front of the camera.

NBC Photo: Chris Haston

You know, with each passing technological evolution the traditional Nielsen ratings get just a little more outdated. Former entertainment lawyer Eric Belloni writes a column about Hollywood and the law at The Hollywood Reporter.

This week he looks at the shows that got illegally file shared the most and NBC’s embattled drama Heroes tops the list with an estimated with 1.6 million downloads. The top 10 also includes SFUniverse faves Supernatural, Smallville and Fringe. Second on the list is now canceled Prison Break, which was also suffering from low ratings. That is to say, at least the way we’re calculating ratings these days.

I’ve said for years that I don’t think we really know what the majority of people are watching out there. For all we know, the highest rated show on TV could be Samantha Who. 

NBC Photo: Adam Taylor

Oh, what a long, strange trip Season 3 has been. After starting the “Days of Future Past-ish” imprisonment of mutants- I mean, “ones of them,” the suddenly sainted Sen. Nathan Petrelli may be our last, best hope. 

Spoilers, intricate plot details and possibly (OK probably) some ranting about Season 3. So don’t read further if you don’t want to know!

NBC Photo: Chris Haston

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Here are a couple of clips to whet your appetite for the Heroes Season Finale (tonight a 9 on NBC).
First up is a clip from the episode and after that, Ali Larter talks to Jimmy Kimmel about the big finish.

Seriously, what is Sylar up to? And can he be killed? Knives to the back of the head are apparently not sufficient. Season 3 comes to an end tonight, as Danko prepares to wipe out all the people with special abilities.

He really can’t do that, or else we don’t have much of a show. It seems like we just started Season 3 and we’re at the end already. The word going around is that a major character is going to die and it’s actually going to stick.

Heroes has always maintained a strong connection to other sci-fi shows including Star Trek. Guest starring tonight as the president is Star Trek:The Next Generation star Michael Dorn. Readers, how do you think it’s going to end? Who’s going to die? Who would you like to see killed off, if anyone?

NBC Photo: Trae Patton

The networks are deciding less is more when it comes to popular shows such as 24 and Lost, opting to film fewer episodes than previous years. Advertising Age said NBC will follow suit, likely cutting the number of Heroes episodes down to 18-20 after doing 25 this season.

Those episodes are also expected to run closer together to minimize storyline interruptions. That’s probably a good move with shows as plot-twisty as genre shows tend to be.

It’s no coincidence the move comes as Heroes continues to struggle in the ratings. Cable networks pioneered the smaller episode count and it does help with creating buzz. As a fan of The Sopranos, it often seemed they were off the air again as soon as they got back.

But the shows do still have to be good. Tighter plotlines and higher stakes may be a good idea for a show that’s meandered a bit through the last two seasons. What’s your take, readers?

NBC Photo: Trae Patton

My wife loved Will Smith’s heroic turn in I Am Legend. Folks loved Sean Penn in I Am Sam. But those I Ams were all just a prelude building up to I Am Sylar. Well, maybe not, but now we’re seeing Sylar’s diabolical plan unfold. Shapeshifting his way into the White House would give Sylar carte blanche to take out whoever he wants. And he’d get a kick out of pushing everybody’s buttons.

How long will the alliance between Sylar and Danko last? I’m thinking until one decides the other’s help is no longer beneficial. I wonder if once that happens, Danko will even get the chance to tell Noah Bennet “You know, I did something really dumb. Can a Danko get a hand with this one?”

While a lot of people have been unhappy with Heroes‘ story developments the past couple of years, you can’t blame Zachary Quinto for the show’s declining fortunes. He has consistently made Sylar one of TV’s most interesting villains. Whether he’s playing FBI agent, cuddling with puppies in an alternative future or just ripping people’s heads open, he takes on each role and makes it fun for us. Because he’s obviously having a lot of fun.

When fake Sen. Petrelli stepped up to the podium at his press conference, you just knew we’re in for a wild ride. If the Fugitives thought things were bad before (and they were), I don’t think they’ve seen anything yet.

Images: NBC/ Chris Haston