Rueben's Ramblings

Hey All,

Here are the entertainment news items for this past week:

RENEWALS

Hulu has finally announced a season two renewal for the period drama The Artful Dodger that starred Thoms Brodie-Sangster (Game of Thrones and Love Actually) as a grown-up Jack Dawkins (aka The Artful Dodger), Maia Mitchell (Good Trouble) and David Thewlis (Harry Potter franchise). The second season will pick up where the heart’s desires of Dodger, Fagin (Thewlis) and Lady Belle (Mitchell) left off, promising more cunning thievery, snappy humor, life-and-death surgeries, and romance with a twist. (TV Line)

Netflix has given A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder a second season renewal, tapping both Emma Myers (also of Wednesday fame) and Zain Iqbal returning in their roles of Pip and Ravi respectively. (TV Line)

MGM+ has given their thriller series From a season four renewal. (Variety)

Peacock has given the Eddie Redmayne-lead assassin thriller The Day of the Jackal a season two renewal. (TV Line)

DEVELOPMENT NEWS

The team behind the Syfy-Amazon hit sci-fi series The Expanse have a new series at Amazon MGM Studios called The Captive’s War, which is based on the book series by James S.A. Corey, which will be set in a distant future of galactic empires and alien civilizations and is inspired by the biblical Book of Daniel. It will follow a group of prisoners who rise from the ashes of catastrophe to destroy their conqueror’s society from within. It is an epic tale about the transformative power of individuality in a totalitarian world. (Variety)

TV CASTING NEWS

Javier Bardem will star in the Apple TV+ series adaptation of Cape Fear based on the novel by John D. MacDonald, the 1962 original film as well as the 1991 remake. This version will focus on the storm coming for happily married attorneys Amanda and Steve Bowden when Max Cady (Bardem), a notorious killer from their past, gets out of prison. (Variety)

Scott Foley (Felicity and Scandal) will recur in season 3 of Will Trent, playing Dr. Seth McDale, the confident and down-to-earth head of emergency medicine at a local hospital and Angie’s (series regular Erika Christensen) new romantic interest. (TV Line)

The Equalier will introduce a pair of new characters later this season that could potentially lead to their own spinoff series. One character, an older male, is reportedly a former CIA operative while the other character, a younger female, is a martial artist with a vast knowledge of weapons and criminology — and a secret origin story. Casting is currently underway. (Deadline and TV Line)

Original Suits alum Gabriel Macht will be back in his role of Harvey Specter for a guest-starring arc in the upcoming NBC Suits spin-off Suits L.A. that is set to debut in Febuary. (Deadline and TV Line)

Storm Reid will not be returning as Gia in the third season of Euphoria on HBO. (TV Line)

Genesis Rodriguez, who is currently starring alongside Zoe Saldana in Lioness, just might be joining season three of The Night Agent over at Netflix. Her role is being kept under wraps, but it’s sounding like she just might be a series regular. Season two of the hit series will get underway starting on January 23, 2025. (Deadline)

Zachary Quinto (Brillian Minds) and Clark Gregg (Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) as well as Patti LuPone and Hank Azaria will appear in a Gilded Age murder mystery limited series called The Artist that will run on the ad-supported streamer The Network, starring alongside Mandy Patinkin, Janet McTeer and Danny Huston. The series will be set in the twilight of the Gilded Age, following an ensemble of the era’s celebrities including Thomas Edison (Azaria), Edgar Degas (Huston) and Evelyn Nesbit who meet at the home of Norman Henry (Patinkin), an eccentric and failing tycoon, and his wife Marian (McTeer) which ends in his untimely demise. Quinto will play Delphin Delmas, a white shoe lawyer from San Francisco while LuPone will play Rosie Morsch, Marian’s (McTeer) mercurial and disapproving sister. Gregg will play Harry Kendall Thaw, the spoiled son of an American coal and railroad baron. (Deadline)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Josh O’Connor (The Crown and Challengers) has joined the cast of the next Steven Spielberg film that is yet-to-be-titled. He joins the cast that already includes Emily Blunt, Colin Firth, Colman Domingo and Bono’s daughter Eve Hewson. There are no details yet about the film, but it will be released in May of 2026. (Variety)

Bridgeron hunk Luke Newton and Pretty Little Liars alum Lucy Hale will star in the sci-fi thriller film White Mars that will be set in an isolated Aquila Research Facility, following microbiologist Sammie (Hale) as she and Leo (Newton) fight to save their fellow crew members from a malevolent entity whose sole intention is to extinguish them all. (Deadline)

Anne Hathaway will star in the upcoming film adaptation of the best-selling novel Verity by Colleen Hoover. Hathaway will play Verity Crawford, a famous author who is unable to finish her thriller novel after a car accident leaves her badly injured. So her husband Jeremy offers a struggling writer named Lowen a huge sum of money to complete the remaining books in the series. Lowen accepts the gig but uncovers secrets — including an unfinished manuscript that hints at chilling admissions about Verity and her family’s past — leaving Lowen to determine if Verity is a gifted fictionist or deranged psychopath. The roles of Jeremy and Lowen have yet to be cast. (Variety)

1883 star Isabel May will play the daughter of Nevel Campbell in Scream 7, the next movie in the long-running franchise. (Variety)

Bailee Madison (Good Witch), Joel Courtney (The Kissing Booth) and Annie Potts (Young Sheldon) [among others] will appear in the rom-com 40 Dates and 40 Nights. The story revolves around Leah Jones (Madison), who is navigating the challenges of dating. Gigi (Potts), her grandmother, bets her a full year’s rent if she can prove love isn’t out there after 40 consecutive dates. (Deadline)

That’s it. Enjoy!