04.30 | Fox spinning off '24' into kids cartoon
Starting this fall, viewers can see what Jack Bauer was like as a child as Fox will spin off '24' into a Saturday morning cartoon. “We’ll see a little Jack Bauer as a member of the Cub Scouts, torturing Arab kids at camp who look suspicious,” says '24' creator Joel Surnow.
Just like the primetime series, the cartoon, '24: Little Jack,' will depict a 24-hour period in the life of young Jack Bauer.
If only this were true...
It wasn't me, honest:
20th Century Fox served YouTube with a subpoena Wednesday demanding the Google-owned viral video site disclose the identity of a user who uploaded copies of entire recent episodes of primetime series "24" and "The Simpsons."
The subpoena, which first came to light on the blog Google Watch, was granted by a judge in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California after being filed by the News Corp.-owned studio on January 18. It is not yet known whether YouTube has complied with the request.
The subpoena reads, in part:
On or about January 8, 2007, Fox became aware that a subscriber ("the Subscriber") of YouTube Inc.s' Internet-based service uploaded pirated copies of the works onto YouTube, making it available for illegal viewing over the Internet to anyone who wishes to watch it. Fox has not authorized this distribution or display of the works. The subpoena request YouTube, Inc. to disclose information sufficient to identify the Subscriber so that Fox can stop this infringing activity.
Here's the post on the Google Watch blog mentioned in the Reuters story.
Gary Newman, Co-President of Twentieth Century Fox Television, discusses '24':
WS: How do you keep a show like '24' fresh season after season?
NEWMAN: Oh boy! If we knew the formula, we’d probably bottle it and sell it or guard it carefully! I think that the key creative team of Joel Surnow, Bob Cochran, Howard Gordon and Evan Katz deserve an enormous amount of credit for finding ways to continue to top themselves with twists and turns each season. At the core, we have a star who has incredible charisma and is magnetic, and people just love Kiefer in this role. Even though the audience knows that at the end he’s going to succeed, they just love the ride. And I guess that if the show has done anything particularly well that has caused it to stand out, and keep people feeling that it’s fresh, it’s that literally each season there are four or five surprises that you just don’t see on network television: from Nina being the mole in season one, to Jack shooting his boss, to the twist at the end of last season with the Chinese government. It’s those sorts of surprises that just when you think they’re going to save the day, they don’t save the day - in one season nerve gas [was actually released]. In other shows they manage to save the day before the unthinkable happens.
Fox is to sell episodes of '24' to DirecTV customers.
Fox will sell access to episodes of "24" and "Prison Break" for six to seven days after the initial broadcast for 99 cents.
They're not making episodes available on iTunes - yet - so it's basically Tivo that you have to pay for. The service will launch later this year, missing the season five premiere hours.
