Futurama and Billions release trailers with Damian Lewis who returns.

by Thinus Ferreira

Futurama and Billions have released new trailers with the animated series that is back after a decade, while Damian Lewis is returning to his role of billionaire Bobby Axelrod for the final Billions season.

Billy Axelrod who left for Switzerland returns for the upcoming 7th and final season of Billions, seen on M-Net (DStv 101) and starting 13 August in the United States, says in the trailer "I'm back now, and I'm wide awake".

According to Showtime's official logline for the final season "alliances are turned on their heads and old wounds are weaponised. Loyalties are tested. Betrayal takes on epic proportions. Enemies become wary friends. And Bobby Axelrod returns, as the stakes grow from Wall Street to the world."

Besides Damian Lewis who left at the end of the fifth season and is coming back, returning cast members in Billions' final season include Paul Giamatti, Corey Stoll, Maggie Siff, David Costabile, Asia Kate Dillon, Dola Rashad, Jeffrey DeMunn, Sakina Jaffrey, Daniel Breaker and Toney Goins. 

Although Billions is ending, Showtime announced that is in active development of several possible spinoff series for the Paramount+ video streaming service. 

Millions will follow "diverse, thirtysomething financial mogul wannabes doing whatever it takes to make in in Manhattan" while Trillions will be based on "fictional stories of the richest people in the world - titans of industry living all over the country but coming into contact and conflict with one another". 

Billions: Miami revolves around the world of private planes in Miami, Florida while Billions: London is set in the United Kingdom's financial world.

Back to the Futurama

The beloved Futurama, gone for a decade, is getting a "Hulurama" revival on the Hulu video streaming service in July, which means the new 8th season of Futurama will very likely show up on M-Net (DStv 101) for South African viewers. UPDATE 3 July 2023: Nope, it's going to Disney+ in South Africa.

While the previous seven seasons of the Matt Groening animated series which ended in 2013 were acquired by M-Net when it was distributed by Fox, Futurama is now part of the Disney contribution to Hulu which sells to M-Net.

The Planet Express crew are back in season eight after they have been cryogenically frozen, with the majority of the original voice cast including Billy West, John DiMaggio, Katey Sagal, Tress MacNeille, Maurice LaMarche, Lauren Tom, Phil LaMarr and David Herman once again lending their voices for their characters like Fry, Leela and Bender. 

The 8th season will have 20 episodes, released in two batches of 10 episodes.

"After a brief 10-year hiatus, Futurama has crawled triumphantly from the cryogenic tube, its full original cast and satirical spirit intact," the show says in a press release.

"The 10 all-new episodes have something for everyone. New viewers will be able to pick up the series from here, while long-time fans will recognise payoffs to decades-long mysteries - including developments in the epic love story of Fry and Leela, the mysterious contents of Nibbler's litter box, the secret history of evil Robot Santa, and the whereabouts of Kif and Amy's tadpoles."

"Meanwhile there's a whole new pandemic in town as the crew explores the future of vaccines, bitcoin, cancel culture and streaming TV."

America's Showtime commissions rival Shaka Zulu drama series to MultiChoice and M-Net's long-gestating Shaka Ilembe; says its show is 'going to rock the world'.

by Thinus Ferreira

America's Showtime TV channel is producing a brand-new Shaka Zulu drama series that will rival MultiChoice and M-Net's long-gestating Shaka Ilembe drama series planned for DStv's Mzansi Magic channel, with Showtime saying its version of the Zulu leader is "going to rock the world".

Showtime in a press release announced that its new drama series, Shaka: King of the Zulu Nation - produced by CBS Studios, Propagate and Fuqua Films and executive produced and directed by Antoine Fuqua - will be "rooted in actual events".

The series will tell "the story of the Zulu empire chief Shake and his unlikely rise to power, uniting multiple tribes across vast stretches of Africa in the early 19th century to transform his power into legend, on par with history's most seminal figures".

Shaka: King of the Zulu Nation as an hourlong drama series is written by Olu Odebunmi and Tolu Awosika.

Showtime says that Shaka: King of the Zulu Nation will be "an epic drama centred around one man's personal journey from stigmatised childhood to warrior king".

"Olu and Tolu have written such an exciting and emotional origin story of an African warrior hero and Antoine's passion for this project, coupled with his formidable talent, promises an epic series unlike any other on television," says Gary Levine, co-president of entertainment at Showtime Networks Inc.

Antoine Fuqua says "This project offers a gateway to our past that is so critical to our global history and yet so often marginalised. Through Shaka: King of the Zulu Nation, we hope to bring this saga to life - all the tears, sweat and blood, all the joy and sorrow, all the intimacy and intensity and humanity. In short, we're going to rock the world with this one".

After almost 3 years M-Net and Bomb Productions are still in pre-production for its own 12-episode Shaka Ilembe drama series for Mzansi Magic (Dstv 161) that it announced in May 2018 to tell the story of King Shaka kaSenzangakhona. 

M-Net said that this black historical drama series will explore the precolonial South African kingdoms that influenced and gave rise to Shaka Zulu and that it would depict the kingdoms of the AmaThethwa, the AmaNdwandwe, AmaQwabe, AmaHlubi and AmaZulu, amongst others, and how they all gave rise to the creation of the heroic leader.

South Africans and viewers worldwide are familiar with the 10-episode, 1986-series Shaka Zulu from the SABC and Harmony Gold USA that was directed by William C. Faure, starring the iconic, late Henry Cele in the adult Shaka role and based on Joshua Sinclair's 1985-novel of the same name.

ALSO READ: 2020 DStv Showcase: The most important announcements and revelations from this year's MultiChoice media event.

ALSO READ: Location scouting underway, casting starting soon, for MultiChoice and M-Net's iconic new Shaka drama series.

ALSO READ: M-Net adds another black historical drama series, Shaka-Ilembe, from Bomb Productions that will explore the precolonial South African kingdoms that influenced and gave rise to Shaka Zulu.

Halo TV series announces 6 cast members, hints that Master Chief's helmet might come off in the science fiction drama.

The Halo TV series from Showtime, distributed globally by CBS Studios International, has announced 6 cast members, and is hinting that the iconic Master Chief's helmet might come off in the new science fiction series.

On Friday Halo announced that Natascha McElhone, Bokeem Woodbine, Shabana Amzi, Bentley Kalu, Natasha Culzac, and Kate Kennedy have been cast in the science fiction drama series based on the hugely popular video game.

They join Pablo Schreiber who has already been cast in the iconic role of Master Chief as Earth's most advanced warrior in the 26th century, and Yerin Ha who will appear as a new character named Kwan Ha, a shrewd, audacious 16-year-old from the Outer Colonies who meets Master Chief at a fateful time for them both.

The 9-episode Halo will start production later this year in Budapest where The Witcher coming to Netflix was also filmed, with Halo that will start to broadcast in early-2021.

With CBS Studios International distributing worldwide, it's highly likely that Halo will end up being shown on M-Net (DStv 101) in South Africa and across sub-Saharan Africa on MultiChoice's DStv satellite pay-TV service and its subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) offering Showmax from its Connected Video division.

In the Halo TV series Natascha McElhone will appear as two characters - Dr Catherine Halsey, the creator of the Spartan supersoldiers, and well as the iconic Cortana, the most advanced artificial intelligence in human history who holds a key to the survival of the race.

Bokeem Woodbine will play Soren-066, a privateer at the fringes of human civilisation whose fate will bring him into conflict with his former military masters as well as his old friend, the Master Chief.

Shabana Azmi will play Admiral Margaret Parangosky, the head of the Office of Naval Intelligence.

The British actor Bentley Kalu will play one of 3 new characters in the Halo TV series and appear as Spartan Vannak-134, a cybernetically augmented supersoldier conscripted at childhood who serves as the deputy to the Master Chief.

The British actor Natasha Culzac will appear in the role of Spartan Riz-028. a focused, professional and deadly, cybernetically enhanced killing machine.

Kate Kennedy will appear in the role of Spartan Kai-125, a courageous, curious, and deadly Spartan supersoldier.

Kyle Killen and Steve Kane are co-showrunners and executive producers, while Darryl Frank and Justin Falvey of Amblin Television will also executive produce along with series director Otto Bathurst and Toby Leslie for One Big Picture, Scott Pennington for Chapter Eleven, and Karen Richards.

Halo is produced by Showtime in partnership with 343 Industries and Amblin Television.

Halo finds its Master Chief in Pablo Schreiner for its live-action TV drama series; adds Australian actress Yerin Ha as a new female character, Quan Ah.

The producers of Halo have cast Pablo Schreiber as its Master Chief in the live-action TV show based on the hugely popular video game, with Yerin Ha who will also be joining the drama series as a new female character, Quan Ah in the Halo universe.

The drama series from Showtime, based on the iconic Xbox video game franchise has cast Pablo Schreiber as Master Chief, Earth's most advanced warrior in the 26th century.

The Master Chief is the only hope of salvation for a civilization pushed to the brink of destruction by the Covenant, an unstoppable alliance of alien worlds committed to the destruction of humanity.

The Australian actress Yerin Ha will play a new character within the Halo world: Quan Ah, a shrewd, audacious 16-year-old from the Outer Colonies who meets Master Chief at a fateful time for them both.

Halo is produced by Showtime in partnership with 343 Industries, along with Steven Spielberg's Amblin Television and will begin production around September 2019 in Budapest, Hungary.

Halo will be distributed internationally by CBS Studios International.

That makes it extremely likely that the drama series will end up in South Africa and Africa shown on M-Net (DStv 101) and MultiChoice's subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) service Showmax.

The Halo producers in a statement says "Halo will weave deeply drawn personal stories with action, adventure and a richly imagined vision of the future".

Kyle Killen and Steven Kane are serving as co-showrunners and executive producers.

Halo is also executive produced by Darryl Frank and Justin Falvey for Amblin Television in partnership with 343 Industries. The director will be Otto Bathurst and Toby Leslie for One Big Picture, Scott Pennington for Chapter Eleven, and Karen Richards.

Otto Bathurst to direct Showtime's science fiction series, Halo; production on the 9-episode first season to start later in 2019.

Otto Bathurst will be the director and executive producer of the science fiction series, Halo that Showtime will produce later in 2019 based on the hugely successful video game series.

Halo now has a 9-episode first season order, with Kyle Killen who will also be serving as executive producer, as well as writer and showrunner.

Otto Bathurst will helm multiple episodes of the live-action series that Showtime is producing in partnership with 343 Industries, along with Steven Spielberg's Amblin Television.

No international or South African broadcaster has yet been announced but it's very likely that M-Net (DStv 101) will eventually grab Halo for South Africa and Africa where several other Showtime drama series reside on MultiChoice's DStv satellite pay-TV platform.

Halo will be distributed globally by CBS Studios International.

Halo will begin production later this year.

In a statement Showtime says "Halo will take place in the universe that first came to be in 2001, dramatizing an epic 26th-century conflict between humanity and an alien threat known as the Covenant."

"Halo will weave deeply drawn personal stories with action, adventure and a richly imagined vision of the future".

Halo video game finally picked up as a live-action, science fiction drama series with a 10-episode first season order.

The popular Halo video game is finally set to become a new TV series with the American TV channel Showtime that has picked up Halo for a first season of 10 episodes 5 years after the first announcement was made.

In May 2013 Microsoft announced that Halo is becoming a TV series for Xbox and a year later in May 2014 said it's working with Showtime to do a duel-type deal where episodes would be on the game console and on the TV channel.

That botched Halo announcement went nowhere after Microsoft and Xbox's plans for producing original content flamed out.

Now Showtime has announced that it will broadcast 10 episodes of a live-action scripted drama version of Halo with Kyle Killen as executive producer, writer and showrunner and with production that will start in early 2019.

"Halo is our most ambitious series ever, and we expect audiences who have been anticipating it for years to be thoroughly rewarded," says David Nevins, Showtime CEO, in a statement.

"In the history of television, there simply has never been enough great science fiction. Kyle Killen's scripts are thrilling, expansive and provocative; Rupert Wyatt is a wonderful, world-building director; and their vision of Halo will enthrall fans of the game while also drawing the uninitiated into a world of complex characters that populate this unique universe."

Halo, set in the 26th century, will "dramatise an epic conflict between humanity and an alien threat known as the Covenant" and weave deeply drawn personal stories with action, adventure and a richly imagined vision of the future".

The long-tired drama series, Homeland, with Claire Danes finally cancelled after 8 seasons.

The 8th season of the drama series Homeland with Claire Danes seen on M-Net (DStv 101) will be its last, the actress confirmed in an American radio interview.

In an interview in America with Howard Stern on radio she confirmed that Homeland is cancelled.

"Yeah, that's it," confirming that Homeland from the Showtime channel is ending after the 8th season.

When she was asked how she feels about it, Claire Danes said she feels "really conflicted".

"I'll be ready. She's a lot, this Carrie-freakin' Mathison character. It's a workout, so I'll be ready for a reprieve from that."

FIGHT FAIL. Showmax offers a subscriber refund for delayed Mayweather McGregor boxing match after Showtime pay-per-view problems in America.

Naspers' subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) service Showmax says it's offering subscribers who signed up to see the Floyd Mayweather and Conor McGregor boxing fight a refund after pay-per-view chaos led to a viewing delay because of encoding issues.

The hyped Floyd Mayweather vs Conor McGregor bout entitled "The Money Fight" was broadcast on SuperSport on MultiChoice's DStv satellite pay-TV platform very early today, with Showmax that promised it would have it available shortly thereafter by 10:00 on Sunday morning - but that didn't happen.

On social media Showmax said the service will offer people who signed up to watch the boxing fight a refund.

In response to a media enquiry about what happened, Showmax says the "The Money Fight" is now available on the service.

The pay-per-view disaster started in America when Showtime, that produced the boxing event for TV, couldn't cope with the large number of Americans who decided to sign up with the pay-per-view method to stream-watch the boxing clash.

The Las Vegas Journal Review reports that  Showtime blamed late buy-ins and internet connectivity issues, which made Showtime delay the match.

For South African viewers it meant a delay from the 05:00 starting time by an hour.

According to Floyd Mayweather "the pay-per-view servers in California and Florida crashed".

Showtime said that "due to high demand, we have reports of scattered outages from various cable and satellite provides and the online offering. We will delay the start of the main event slightly to allow for systems to get on track. We do not expect a lengthy delay."

The Showtime delay in America caused a knock-on effect for Showmax.

"Once we get the fight file, we then encode it into the various qualities needed and upload it to our content management system," Showmax told TVwithThinus.

"We were on the back foot a bit from the more than one hour delay to the start of the fight and the fact that it lasted longer than we'd anticipated."

"We'd run a bunch of tests ahead of time on express coding that had worked fine, but on the day we ran into some challenges and had to fall back on our standard encoding procedure which is quite a bit slower."

"We understand how frustrating this is for customers and ask anyone affected to get in touch with the customer care team. In the meantime we're going to do a full post-mortem to understand exactly what went wrong and to make sure we don't have a repeat in the future," said Showmax.

BREAKING. TopTV loses 3 further TV channels as Turner Broadcasting immediately yanks the Showtime, Silver and Star! channels.

You're reading it here first. 

It does not look good for On Digital Media (ODM) and its TopTV platform: TopTV is losing another 3 TV channels within days as Turner Broadcasting System (TBS) is yanking its Showtime, Silver and Star! channels from the struggling South African pay-TV service.

The triple whammy loss of content from its bouquet is the latest barrage of bad news to hit TopTV which has faced a constant uphill struggle with losing channels during the whole of 2012 and even before.

TopTV is not saying why Turner Broadcasting System is immediately removing Showtime (TopTV 111), Silver (TopTV 112) and Star! (TopTV 179) other than that it's happening for "operational reasons" - the vague non-descript reason airlines give to passengers for a litany of problems they do know the reason to, but don't want to be specific about.

With no reason given, it's all but certain that South Africa's TV industry will speculate that the channels are being removed because Turner - which is definitely knowledgeable about TopTV's problems and a company in business rescue since October - no longer has faith in the platform with the resultant implications which arise once a company is placed in business rescue.

TopTV might not be able to pay its debt or money owed to Turner in exchange for getting the channels. Turner might possibly be afraid that it won't be paid and now wants out of carriage agreements to try and cut potential financial losses should TopTV not be able to exit business rescue in the way in which the 1time airline which recently folded and which also entered business rescue, was unable to recover.

TopTV says Turner Broadcasting System (which also runs Boomerang, CNN International, Cartoon Network and TCM on rival MultiChoice's DStv) "recently informed" TopTV that the 3 TV channels will suddenly be discontinued from 31 December.

Showtime was a movie channel. Star! was a general entertainment and entertainment news channel with a strong emphasis on Hollywood and Hollywood news and the only way South African viewers could see the daily entertainment news show Showbiz Tonight (produced by CNN). Silver was South Africa's only real cinema nouveau TV channel with some art house independent movies from a library catalogue of titles from mostly the 80's and 90's.

Turner has been piping all three of these TV channels into South African from Scandinavia through the Scandinavian television broadcaster NonStop Television which is part of the Turner Broadcasting System.

TopTV is now again telling subscribers that the ailing South African pay-TV operator - which is urgently looking for local investment and backers with deep pockets - will once again begin the process of looking to find replacement channels - a process TopTV has had to do several times just this year.

"The supplier of the three affected channels, Showtime, Silver and Star! has taken the decision to terminate the African distribution of its channels for operational reasons, and this decision is thus beyond the control of TopTV," says the Woodmead based pay-TV operator in a statement issued late on Wednesday.

Last month TopTV lost the 1KZN TV channel after the community TV station jumped from TopTV to DStv, quickly followed by Manchester United TV (MUTV) which suddenly disappeared without warning and terminated its contract with TopTV with immediate effect because it no longer wanted to be on the platform.

TopTV lost Hi Nolly and One Music in November 2011 and 2012 started with TopTV losing Current TV in March.

The ongoing loss of channels means that TopTV's product and channel offering to subscribers are not expanding like MultiChoice's DStv offering, since TopTV's newly added channels - which happens after a lag period - only serve to replace channels which had been lost. TopTV added no new big commercial TV channels in either 2011 or 2012.

"TopTV is grateful for the continued support of its loyal subscribers during this period, and would like to reassure them that the company is working hard on a renewed product plan for the New Year," says TopTV about the latest channel loss crisis facing the company.

Ian Woodrow, TopTV's vice president for channels says in the statement that "although this comes at a challenging time in the company's development, with a business rescue process currently underway, TopTV is confident that it will be able to secure alternative channels early in 2013."

"In the interim, and until these replacements are found, we will endeavour to secure additional channels and programming that will be of interest to our subscribers," says Ian Woodrow.

With Discovery Networks International which started the Discovery Science, TLC and Investigation Discovery on TopTV but suddenly made TLC and Investigation Discovery also available on DStv a year ago thereby diluting TopTV's exclusive product value offering (the great Discovery Science is still only available on TopTV only), TopTV has only one remaining strong and unique channel distributor left on its ailing platform: Fox.

Fox International Channels Africa (FIC Africa) supplies the Fox Entertainment, FX and Fox Retro channels to ODM which can only be seen on TopTV.

FIC Africa, through Fox Entertainment and FX has brought and continue to bring South African pay-TV viewers who are subscribed to TopTV great series and exclusive TV properties like The Walking Dead, Hell on Wheels, Falling Skies, Copper as well as other shows very close to the American broadcasting dates.

This excellent programming and international distribution strategy adds big value to TopTV's platform since these remaining unique channels have exclusive content which are rolled out quickly and can only be seen on TopTV in South Africa.


ALSO READ: Turner aint talking: How terrible that Turner isn't willing to talk to TopTV subscribers and say why they're suddenly yanking all their channels.

BREAKING. NonStop Television confirms Showtime, Star! and Silver coming to On Digital Media's (ODM) TopTV platform.

NonStop Television of Sweden has confirmed that its three TV channels Showtime, Star! and the art and independent movies channel Silver will be broadcast on On Digital Media's (ODM) new TopTV platform when the new satellite pay TV operator launches in May.

"South Africa is a fast growing, exciting TV market and we look forward to expanding NonStop Television internationally together with ODM,'' says Ignas Scheynius, CEO of NonStop Television. "The timing is perfect, as we project an increased pay-TV household penetration along with the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa.''