Attention 'Chuck' fans! The breaking news out of Comic Con is that Chuck's mom is ... Linda Hamilton! Sarah Connor herself -- talk about lucky genes.

To start off the packed 'Chuck' panel in Ballroom 20 Saturday morning, the audience was warned that evil organisation The Ring had taken control of the room -- showing the crowd a rapidly-edited video to program everyone as intersects, just like Chuck himself.

Then 'Chuck' stars Zachary Levi and Joshua Gomez appeared on the video screens in a prerecorded message to see if the audience was feeling okay, before the eponymous Jeffster (Jeff and Lester - Scott Krinsky and Vik Sahay) hijacked the screens with a ... reinterpretation of Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance" video, complete with fans doubling as wind machines, and spray cans for smoke machines. Suffice it to say, Vik Sahay had some wicked dance moves. (Check out the video after the jump!)

The whole cast -- Zachary Levi, Joshua Gomez, Yvonne Strahovski, Adam Baldwin, Sarah Lancaster, Ryan McPartlin, Vik Sahay, Scott Krinsky and Mark Christopher Lawrence, as well as show creators Josh Schwartz and Chris Fedak, were then introduced for a lively and hilarious panel.

Did the cast have doubts about 'Chuck' being renewed? Adam Baldwin, who plays John Casey, explained, "There's always honest cynicism about these things, but the network and the fans believed in us, and here we are."

Series creator Josh Schwartz mentioned that next season will be driven by Chuck's search for his mom, and explained his thought process in casting the legendary actress: "Linda Hamilton lives in the universe of this show - she's such an icon in terms of action female badass mom, which really speaks to what we're doing."

Apparently, Hamilton had heard about the fans campaigning for her and called Schwartz up, saying "So I hear I'm Chuck's mom?" -- "How could I say no to that?" Schwatz laughed.

Another question was about Chuck and Morgan as a spy team ... According to co-executive producer Chris Fedak: "Team Bartowski is still going to be together - we love seeing them working together."

Olivia Munn, Stone Cold Steve Austin, Isaiah Mustafa (The Old Spice guy) and Dolph Lundgren are all slated to guest star this season (also Nicole Richie, which the room didn't care about).

The Buy More is now owned and operated by the CIA, so it has the most badass employees ever -- quite a change.

Every week there will be a new kickass CIA operative green-shirt working at store with Team Bartowski, recast with someone awesome, but each going under the alias of "Greta," regardless of whether they're a man or a woman -- Munn will be Greta the first episode back, Mustafa the second, that's as far as they've got in terms of casting.

On the fan-favorite relationship between Chuck and Sarah, Levi says the love has always been there with between them -- their relationship hasn't really changed through the seasons in that respect.

Fedak said that they've learned their lesson about putting people between Chuck and Sarah. Schwartz said Daniel Shaw (Brandon Routh) was a great villain, but Chuck and Sarah have an undeniable chemistry that's hard to replicate, so they've learned some things. "This year you'll be very happy," he promised.

What about the undeniable chemistry between odd-couple team, Chuck's BFF Morgan (Joshua Gomez) and John Casey (Adam Baldwin)? Baldwin asked Gomez what Morgan likes best about John Casey: Gomez mentioned that Casey "has very soft hands." Adam is "looking forward to working with this guy" more this season.

It gave Joshua a lot of angst that Ryan McPartlin (who plays Devon "Captain Awesome" Woodcomb) was made an unofficial spy and brought onto Chuck's team before he was; it made McPartlin happy to one-up Gomez, but "Captain Awesome couldn't take it" -- now everyone's happy, McPartlin laughed.

Schwartz concluded, "There's a real tension in the relationship between Chuck and Ellie because he promised to quit the spy game, but he also has to find mom." They figure Jeff (Krinsky) will be the last to know that Chuck's a spy. And if he does find out, he probably won't remember it in the morning.

Check out Jeffster's ... surreal version of 'Bad Romance' below:



What do you think of Linda Hamilton's casting? Are you excited to see a more beefed up, CIA-based Buy More? And are you happy to see Chuck and Sarah finally get it together?


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