Last month, the spinoff to the hugely popular The Walking Dead began its first season on AMC. The series, Fear the Walking Dead is a prequel of sorts, which shows the beginning of the zombie apocalypse. The pilot has been posted online to watch for free, and it is worth a watch!

Episode Details: Season 1, Episode 1 “Pilot” A highly dysfunctional blended family is forced together when they realize a reported virus is actually the onset of the undead apocalypse.

You can watch the series opener online for free here. The show stars Kim Dickens, Cliff Curtis, Frank Dillane, Alycia Debnam-Carey, Elizabeth Rodriguez, Mercedes Mason, Lorenzo James Henrie, and Rubén Blades, and was co-created by The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman and Sons of Anarchy writer Dave Erickson.

The Walking Dead returns with its 6th season on October 11, 2015.

Check out these The Walking Dead related products…

Wonder Woman Revealed
Sure, Warner Brothers and DC Entertainment released some Dark Knight Returns inspired footage for Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice, but that was slightly overshadowed by the reveal of the movie’s Wonder Woman. Until now it was unknown if Gal Gadot would even don a costume, but here she is in a darkened version of her classic suit. The amazon warrior looks very similar to another warrior princess, but personally I don’t have any issue with that. Hopefully the outfit will get some classic red and blue before the trinity of heroes team up in Justice League.

Josh Brolin is Thanos
The Marvel Studios panel had almost everyone from Avengers: Age of Ultron in attendance, including Robert Downey, Jr, Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Jeremy Renner, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Elizabeth Olsen, Paul Bettany, Cobie Smulders, Samuel L Jackson, and James Spader, but joining the panel was someone unexpected; Josh Brolin who will be stepping into the boots of Marvel’s cosmic big bad Thanos. He jumped on the stage wearing the Infinity Gauntlet, ate a rose that Robert Downey Jr gave him, and showed that he will be a force to be reckoned with… eventually.

Evil Dead: The Series
Talk about unexpected. There was nt an Evil Dead screening or anniversary panel or anything like that. Instead, during the Screen Gems panel Sam Raimi, there to talk about The Last of Us, dropped a bomb on the audience; he is developing Evil Dead as a TV series with Bruce “Ash” Campbell and Ivan Raimi. Campbell followed up the announcement with the reveal that if it happens, he will star in the series. The team is no stranger to TV, having worked on shows such as Jack of All Trades and Xena: Warrior Princess together, and each having a hand in many other shows. God, I hope this happens.

The Walking Dead Season 5 Trailer
Not many TV shows get presented in Hall H, but The Walking Dead is a show that has earned its place in the large ballroom. AMC aimed to please the crowd and showed a lengthy (and spoiler filled) trailer for the new season. There is so much packed into this trailer (you can watch it here); what secrets do Terminus hold? How will our survivors get out? What new characters were revealed? Where is Beth? I’m not posting the spoilers here, but the release of this trailer alone makes the San Diego Comic Con worth it.

What piece of news from the 2014 San Diego Comic Con excites you the most? Which of these 4 awesome things is your favorite?

The San Diego Comic Con has begun and with it we are being flooded with awesome geek news- from both the actual con and the lead up to it. Lets start with one of the biggest comic book movies that is currently in production…

Bishop (Omar Sy- pictured to the left in costume) has been confirmed to appear in X-Men: Days of Future Past! The time traveling mutant has been rumored to be part of the cast, but we did not get confirmation until this past week. With Day of Future Past‘s story involving time travel, he was a good candidate for a role, especially when you consider the other notable time traveling mutant and fan favorite Cable, has had his parents killed off before he could be born (Scott Summers is his father and a clone of Jean Grey is his mother- but the real Jean Grey raised him in the future in someone else’s body… yeah, we don’t have to get into the specifics. Maybe it is a good thing that Bryan Singer choose Bishop instead of Cable). I just hope Bishop’s role is not a cameo.

Lets stay on topic with some more Marvel Comics adaptation news. (SPOILER ALERT! SPOILER ALERT!) Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD just keeps sounding better and better. First they got Joss Whedon on board to write and direct it. They put together an awesome writing/producing team of  Maurissa Tancharoen and Jed Whedon (Dollhouse, Dr. Horrible). Brought Clark Gregg’s Phil Coulson back to life after his tragic Avengers death. Put together a damn good cast with Ming-Na Wen, J. August Richards, Brett Dalton, Chloe Bennet, and Elizabeth Henstridge. And now from the floor of the San Diego Comic Con and the show’s first public screening we have confirmation of the return of Agent Maria Hill (played by the wonderful Cobie Smulders). I am so excited for this show (premieres on September 24th). I just can not wait for the further adventures of the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division.

The Walking Dead premiered a first look trailer for season 4 and my jaw is still on the floor. The footage might be spoiler-y or it could just be misleading. We’ll have to wait for the show to return on October 13th to really find out. You can watch it here. The trailer gives us a first look at Lawrence Gilliard Jr as a very (and I mean very) different Bob Stookey than the one we met in the comics, along with Tyreese in a scene that looks like it is ripped from the comics but in a different location, Michonne on a horse, Rick and Tyreese ready to trade blows, and a bunch of new faces (both alive and getting eaten). We can’t be sure if this was footage from the first episode back or the first few episodes, but it looks like when The Walking Dead returns, it will waste no time in jumping back into the action and racing forward. For better or worse, there was no sign of the Governor in the trailer… We’ll have to wait and see what he might be planning.

Keep checking back as we try to round of the most exciting news coming out of San Diego and we’ll be giving away another DVD this week. What movie? You’ll have to keep checking back to see!

We’re back with some television news for you to fall into.

Only a handful of years since his last retirement from The Tonight Show, it appears that the curtain is closing on Jay Leno once again in 2014. As expected, he will be passing the torch to Saturday Night Live alum and Late Night host Jimmy Fallon. This time around it seems much more likely that Leno will not steal the show back as he did when Conan O’Brien took over the hosting duties in 2009. Speaking of Conan, his own late night show over on TBS has been renewed through November of 2015.

With Fallon moving to The Tonight Show, rumors have begun about who might replace him on Late Night with the frontrunner seemingly being fellow SNLer Seth Meyers. Personally I think Meyers would be a great fit.

USA Network has announced their summer slate premiere dates! Lets start with Burn Notice (pictured left), the spy action series will start its seventh season on Thursday, June 6 at 9pm. It will be followed by the new series Graceland, which stars Daniel Sunjata and Aaron Tveit. Like Burn, the series is an action drama (and I’m sure it will have its share of lighthearted fare).  A week later on Wednesday June 12th, Royal Pains and Necessary Roughness’ new seasons begin. Pains at 9pm and Roughness at 10pm. Then you’ll have to wait almost another week for the return at Covert Affairs and Suits on Tuesday June 16th (also 9pm and 10pm).

The only standout USA Network show missing from the lot is White Collar, which will return with a new season in the fall (hey, they have to save something for their fall schedule).

Spoilers! Turn away if you have not watched the season finale of The Walking Dead. The third season of the zombie survival drama was really strong up until the last couple episodes. It went out without the bang everyone was expecting and that AMC hyped so loudly. It did have its fair share of surprises, including the fact that the season’s villain, the Governor (David Morrissey), survived. Everyone that I know (and myself) included counted on him being killed and we were taking bets on who would/should do it (Maggie and Michonne topped the list of would-be killers). AMC has announced that Morrissey will indeed be back next season as a regular. I honestly have no idea where they could take this character. I guess he can go out and build a new army to attack the prison- but how can they do this and keep things fresh? We shall see when The Walking Dead returns in October.

All season has been building to this; the prison vs Woodbury. The preview show’s Woodbury’s evil “Governor” leading an army that outnumbers Rick’s prison crew by at least two (if not three) to one. Will there be a massacre at the prison? Does Rick have a plan up his sleeve? Will they abandon ship? As readers of this website know, I am a long time fan of The Walking Dead comics and the thing that amazes me about where we are in the show is that I have no idea what will happen next. The television series is so different than the comic and both are as suspenseful and intriguing as each other. I can not wait to see what happens next.

Official description, “Welcome to the Tombs”: With the Governor’s attack looming, Rick and his people need to determine if the prison is worth defending.

The Walking Dead season finale airs tonight on AMC at 9pm. After the episode, Talking Dead takes viewers behind the scenes and host Chris Hardwick talks to some of the brains behind the show. Also on tonight…

8PM

BBC: Doctor Who: The Doctors Revisited (special)
CBS: Amazing Race 22 (reality competition)
PBS: Call the Midwife (period drama)
COOK: Cupcake Wars (cooking competition)
HISTORY: The Bible (dramatic retelling)
TRAVEL: Trip Flip (docu)
STYLE: Jerseylicious (reality)

9PM

HBO: Game of Thrones (supernatural action drama)
ABC: Revenge (drama)
CBS: The Good Wife (drama)
PBS: Mr. Selfridge (period drama)
BRAVO: Married to Medicine (reality)
FOOD: Worse Cooks in America (cooking competition)
LIFE: Army Wives (drama)

10PM

AMC: Talking Dead (live talk show)
ABC: Red Widow (acion drama)
FOOD: Chopped (cooking competition)
HISTORY: Vikings (period action drama)
LIFE: The Client List (drama)
SHOW: House of Lies (drama)
ANIMAL: Finding Bigfoot (reality)

In the last Pit column we talked about some movie news, including Ghostbusters 3, the next Muppets adventure, and FOX’s upcoming reboot of Marvel Comic’s Fantastic Four. Today lets look at some television news bits.

Lets start with a show that has been breaking Cable ratings records left and right, the AMC zombie horror series The Walking Dead. The show had it’s Mid-Season finale and left us with a reunion and a cliffhanger to keep us on our toes until it is back on the air come February 10th. The network will also be giving us something pretty cool to chew on starting on February 14th; an encore presentation of the first and second season of the show broadcast is beautiful black and white- just like the comic the show is based on. AMC previously did this with just the pilot, but it will be pretty awesome to see more episodes in a style that is close to the comic book. Speaking about the comic (spoilers), this past week issue #105 hit stands and sees Carl across enemy lines after confronting Neegan last issue. The official description for the issue is short and to the point, “Sing me a song.” Will Carl live through this?

Cult fan favorite Gillian Anderson will be returning to television after a ten year break. The X-Files star will be joining NBC’s upcoming prequel to the Hannibal series of books for an undetermined amount of episodes. She joins Mads Mikkelsen, who portrays the title character made famous by Anthony Hopkins, and Hugh Dancy who steps in as FBI agent Will Graham, who was expertly portrayed by William Petersen in  Michael Mann’s Manhunter and later by Edward Norton in Brett Ratner’s sub-par Red Dragon. Anderson’s character will get to look into just what makes Hannibal tick as she is described as “Dr. Lecter’s personal psychiatrist” by Bryan Fuller, the creator of the new series. Fuller is the man behind Dead Like Me, Wonderfalls, and Pushing Daisies. Most recently he tried to revive/reboot the Munsters with Mockingbird Lane.

After failing hard last year with H8R and more recently having mediocre results with the musical chairs inspired game show Oh Sit! (which was renewed for a second season), The CW is getting back into the reality game with two new shows; The Hunt and Perfect Score. The Hunt is the CW’s attempt at building their own version of Survivor meets The Hunger Games. They describe the show as an “intense wilderness competition” that sees twelve teams of two players facing off in games to test their survival skills and endurance.  The second new show, Perfect Score,is a dating game show that gives players the chance to win cash prizes if they are able to identify their “perfect match”. Neither show has a premiere date. On the narrative side, The CW also has a young Wonder Woman series tentatively titled Amazon in the works as a complement to Arrow. In the very least you need to give props to the Network for keeping their slate fresh and with a lot of variety.

Tonight, just in time for Halloween we can get scared with an all new episode of The Walking Dead at 9pm on AMC. Official Description: “Save the Last One” The group await Shane’s return, unaware that he’s trapped in a school surrounded by zombies; Daryl and Andrea scour the woods for a missing person.

Last week’s episode airs before the new one at 8pm with an encore at 10pm and Talking Dead at 11pm. This week’s guests on Talking Dead  include The Guild star/creator Felicia Day, comedy actor Jon Heder and Dead executive producer (and big time movie producer) Gale Anne Hurd. Thankfully AMC Network was smart enough to already give the greenlight to the zombie series for a third season, although the pick up announcement was lacking an amount of episodes ordered. I will watch for as long as the series airs.

Also new tonight:

8PM

ABC: Once Upon a Time (fairy tale drama)
CBS: Amazing Race 19 (reality competition)
FOX: The Simpsons/Allen Gregory (animation)
NBC: Sunday Night Football (sports)
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9PM

ABC: Desperate Housewives (drama)
CBS: The Good Wife (drama)
FOX: Family Guy/The Cleveland Show (animation)
FOOD: Next Iron Chef: Super Chefs (reality competition)
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10PM

ABC: Pan Am (period drama)
CBS: CSI: Miami (crime drama)
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What will you be watching tonight? Let us know in the comments!