tin man

If you haven't entered our latest giveaways yet, here's a reminder that some are ending today. You've got until 5PM Eastern today to enter the Dr. Katz complete series giveaway and the Christmas Time in South Park giveaway. You've got until next thursday to enter The OC complete series DVD giveaway and the Gilmore Girls season seven DVD giveaway. Lastly, you've got until next Monday to enter the big Tin Man prize pack giveaway (iPod Nano!)

Just head on over to the post linked above, read through the rules and make the applicable comment there (not here!) We'll notify the winners next week.

Good luck!

As you can see, we're doing something different this week with giveaways. We have a bunch from Monday, two from earlier today, and now this. So, what the heck -- time to give away more stuff!

This time we've got something a bit different. Sci Fi's pulling all the stops on promoting their upcoming TV movie, Tin Man (airing December 2), and I'm pretty jealous of the winners of this one. Two winners will receive a blue 8GB Apple iPod Nano (one of the new, fat ones), a very cool Tin Man board game (pictured above, with metal game pieces) and a Tin Man comic book. Read on for details!

There's a preview for the upcoming SciFi Channel miniseries Tin Man up on YouTube. It's a more modern and sinister take on The Wizard of Oz. The video is also embedded after the jump.

Apparently, the Outer Zone (Oz. Outer Zone. Get it?) is ruled by an evil sorceress named Azkadellia (what? Not Elphaba? I guess you'll have to stick to the musical for that). Following in the tradition of the strong female protagonist, Dorothy "DG" Gale is now a midwestern waitress caught in a freak storm that transports her to the Outer Zone where she has to kick butt and take names.

NBC's got a lot of new shows this fall. The panels have been non-stop and swag-free today -- and not without a bit of controversy.

First up was Law & Order creator Dick Wolf and new Law & Order cast members Alicia Witt (CI), Adam Beach (SVU), and Jeremy Sisto (Law & Order).

Sisto's character on L&O comes with emotional baggage that makes the angst he carried around as Rachel Griffith's brother on Six Feet Under seem like a birthday party, which is interesting since Wolf is no fan of serial drama.

Sick of me yet? Well don't worry, this the last post I've got for you about my trip ... probably. I felt it was right of me to conclude everything with some overall thoughts on the experience of visiting these sets, a quick rundown on what I've already posted (don't worry, it's just the links) and a consolidation of the images, including some new ones.

So, to start of, here's a quick rundown of what was already posted ...

It's hard to believe that the previous three set visits happened in one day, not to mention the three panels. The next day we were up at the crack of dawn and ready to embark on the last stop of our tour, the set of the new Flash Gordon series. We'd also be seeing some footage and artwork from the new Sci Fi miniseries and "re-imagining" of The Wizard of Oz, Tin Man.

I've been sitting on announcing this for over a month now, since there's all sorts of things that could go wrong and, well, plans can change. But now that I'm finally here I can let you in on what's going on. I'm flying clear across the country for a very good cause -- to visit the sets of Battlestar Galactica, Stargate Atlantis, Eureka and Flash Gordon, complete with Q&A's with some of the cast and crew. Oh, and I hear we're going to see a little bit of that Wizard Of Oz reimagining, Tin Man, while we're at it.

Stay tuned here at TV Squad for more updates as soon as I'm able to get online and throw something at you. I start out bright and early tomorrow morning, so if you've got any questions you'd like to ask folks involved with any of the above mentioned shows, fire away in the comments below. I'm hoping I'll be able to shoot some updates via our Twitter account, too, so be sure to check that out to see what I'm up to for the next few days, or you can follow the tiny widget after the jump in this post. Needless to say, I'm pretty frack'n pumped!

Remember when Brett mentioned Tin Man a few months ago? The miniseries, debuting on Sci Fi in December, is a re-imagining of The Wizard of Oz, this time set in the Outer Zone (note the acronym) and starring Zooey Deschanel (a total celeb-crush of mine) Alan Cumming and Richard Dreyfuss (who I don't have crushes on).

The miniseries is filming in Vancouver, and so is the new Flash Gordon series. Since both series use some of the same retro-futuristic sets, the folks involved with Flash Gordon will be making a few tweaks to certain Tin Man sets and incorporating them into the design for the planet Mongo, home of Ming the Merciless.

That's not a bad way to save production money, and it's not like it hasn't been done before. Once, while Leonard Nimoy was sick for a month with pneumonia, a horse from Bonanza was given fake Vulcan ears and played Spock for four episodes. That's why Kirk rode around on Spock's back for all subsequent episodes, so the series didn't lose its continuity.

The Sci Fi channel has brought in two writers from 24, Steven Long Mitchell and Craig Van Sickle, to reimagine The Wizard Of Oz as a mini-series called Tin Man. I suppose saying you hired writers from 24 sounds better than saying you hired writers/producers from She Spies...

I kid. I saw every episode of She Spies. Anyway, the post at Warp Section has some of the details for what they have in mind. Dorothy has become a "goth hottie named DG" while Oz is now the Outer Zone, an ethnically diverse alternate universe setting for DG's adventure.

The post also mentions that it will be a six-hour story, but Sci Fi Wire says it will be four. I guess we'll have to wait and see on that. This could really go either way. It's tough to mess with a classic, but I think Sci Fi has earned the benefit of the doubt with what they have done with Battlestar Galactica. Plans call for a 2007 release.

[ via Netscape.com ]