Stop everything. We have a new Buffy!
It’s official. We have a new Buffy.
15 year-old Ryan Kiera Armstrong, who you might know from Star Wars: Skeleton Crew, will be playing the new vampire slayer who presumably won’t be named Buffy as OG slayer Sarah Michelle Gellar is in the new show too.
There is some novelty in an actual teenager being cast in the lead role of a show like this and not an older teen/twentysomething. SMG was 20 when she portrayed the 15 year-old Buffy Summers in the 1997 show.
I’m not entirely sure who this new Vampire Slayer show will be for. Revivals of shows that were around when I was a teen/twentysomething in the 90s/00s never seem to attract younger audiences and they’re almost always pitched too young for fans of the original to stick with the new version for too long.
Going back for a new swing at the old premise for the show seems a bit misguided. But, I was very into the show when it originally aired and will check this out with some curiosity.
Seven has a new news chief
I’m not sure anyone was entirely surprised to hear that Anthony De Ceglie, the head of news at Australia’s Channel 7, was leaving the network. He’ll be CEO of new NRL team the Perth Bears.
De Ceglie was promoted into the role at Seven with no prior TV experience, but had driven the launch of Seven West Media’s The Nightly digital news product.
Now, I’m no fan of The Nightly - it’s essentially a flipbook magazine distributed online that has a really clunky consumption experience. Murdoch did it better with the short-lived The Daily iPad app back in 2011 - it was a publication that was made to take advantage of the iPad interface and wasn’t just digitising an old-school magazine product.
And De Ceglie did himself no favours in a fairly ridiculous interview he gave to
at Unmade back in August of last year:
But, amid the work De Ceglie did at Seven, I did like that he took some pretty wild swings in trying to bring a different energy and accessibility to the main news bulletin each night. He was mocked for it at the time and the career obit pieces circling around today all make mention of it with a snarky tone, but he was the guy responsible for adding horoscopes to the news, along with a weekly comedy skit written and performed by friend of ABW Mark Humphries.
Sure, horoscopes are inherently silly. But so is the idea of a nightly weather report in 2025 and we turn time over to that every night.
It was good that De Ceglie was trying things that were different. But, it should be noted that those were the only big swings he seemed to take.
Read: Mediaweek
Ray Kuka, the 7NEWS Perth News Director and current Deputy Director of News, will take over from De Ceglie. Also announced was that Sarah Stinson, currently Director of Morning Television at Seven, will join the Seven West Media executive team.
Read: Mediaweek
Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning [Spoiler free thoughts]
Out in cinemas on Saturday is the latest Mission: Impossible film. The Final Reckoning is being sold with Avengers: Endgame vibes, suggesting that it might be the final outing for Tom Cruise as Ethan Hunt.
Now, this is a film franchise I absolutely love. 2018’s Mission: Impossible - Fallout may be one of the best times I have ever had in the cinema. But I’ll admit that I wasn’t crazy about the last one, M: I - Dead Reckoning. And, well, the new one is very much part two of that same film.
I wasn’t exactly sitting in the cinema stone-faced. It’s got some moments. And the finale is genuinely pretty well put together. It dispatches the bad guy with an action that audibly made me laugh and cheer.
The problem I had with it mostly (a criticism of Part One I had as well) is that it just isn’t very fun.
Part of the joy of these films is seeing the characters involved in really audacious acts where they are pushing the limits of personal safety and often a literal ticking clock.
This film offers both of those elements, but there’s no tension build to support any of it. The film starts with high tension and never breaks from that sensation for the entire near-three hour run-time. So, when you as an audience are sitting there in moments where your pulse should be getting a bit faster as you get caught up in it all - that never happens.
And then you have Tom Cruise in the water engaged in a physical activity that is so ridiculous that it never seems like he’s pushing the limits of personal safety because it’s too big and unbelievable.
If this does turn out to be the last Mission: Impossible with Cruise, I’d like to see this return to being a TV property for a while to give it a rest. I’d be very much up for a weekly mission each week on Paramount+. (Especially if Jim Phelps was leading the team…)
Also worth noting is that the IMAX screening I was at opened with a short video of Tom Cruise talking about seeing the film on the big screen and there’s no other experience like it.
And sure… but on Wednesday I had a great deal more fun watching a genuinely tense and gripping three episodes of Andor, which delivered a lot of the same thrills a Mission: Impossible outing should be offering. And I watched that on my phone and TV at home.
News Desk
Michael J Fox will reunite with showrunner Bill Lawrence (they worked together on Spin City) in a recurring role on Apple TV+ comedy Shrinking. Read: TV Line
James Van Der Beek has joined the cast of Legally Blonde prequel Elle for Prime Video. Read: Deadline
The George Clooney-led stage play version of Good Night and Good Luck will be broadcast live on CNN on June 7. Clooney loves live drama - you’ll recall the two live ER episodes he was involved with, along with broadcast of live play Fail Safe in 2000. The recording of GNaGL will stream somewhere at a later point that is still to be decided. Read: New York Times
Kelli Giddish will return to Law & Order: SVU as a series regular in Season 27. Read: Variety
There’s a good interview with Josh Holloway at THR about the difficult seven years he has had with limited work opportunities prior to new show Duster. Read: THR
The UK version of Prime Video’s international format Last One Laughing has been renewed for a second season. Read: Deadline
Trailer Park
Task debuts on HBO Max in September. It’s the new show from Mare of Easttown creator Brad Ingelsby.
Bridgerton returns for season 4 on Netflix next year.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is back for season 3 on July 17.
That’s the newsletter for today.
Consider becoming a paid supporter of Always Be Watching.
Connect with Dan on Bluesky. Connect with Dan on Letterboxd. Connect with Dan on Linkedin. Email Dan @ alwaysbewatching.com or just reply to this email.
