Showing posts 1 - 5 of 6 matching: donald faison
Monday, May 2, 2022
Dead Legends
The CW has finally ended the suspense by dropping the axe on DC's Legends of Tomorrow after seven seasons. You can read more details in "'DC's Legends of Tomorrow' Canceled at the CW" at Variety.com, but what this means for Booster boosters is that we are unlikely to be seeing Donald Faison reprise as Booster Gold.
(Could he show up in The Flash? Or could WB decide to continue the Legends story on HBO Max at a later date? Who knows. Television executives are unstable people; they could do *anything*. The point here is that there won't be an eighth season on CW this fall.)
This marks the second time that Booster Gold has appeared in a live-action television show, and the second time that the show has ended shortly thereafter. Eleven years ago, Booster had a guest starring appearance in "Booster," the 18th of 22 episodes in the 10th and final season of CW's Smallville. The biggest difference between the two situations is that it had been announced a year in advance that the tenth season would be Smallville's last, giving the series the opportunity to build to a fitting finale. No such luck for Legends, which will end with all of its characters in jail for crimes against history. (Anyone else having Seinfled flashbacks?)
It's starting to look like Booster Gold is becoming the Pariah of the live-action DC Universe: doomed to arrive in a new Earth just as is it consumed by the great darkness. Frankly, since each television series is a derivation of the one, true DC continuity now known as Earth-0, maybe it's fitting that secret Time Master Booster Gold arrives in the nick of time to prune these alternate Earths.
It's a dirty job, but somebody's got to do it. Gotta make room for new shows somehow.
Comments (1) | Add a Comment | Tags: cancellation cw donald faison legends of tomorrow television variety.com
Friday, March 25, 2022
At Least I Can Appreciate His Honesty
Now that Donald Faison is playing Booster Gold in the CW's "Arrowverse," there appears to be a groundswell of fan support for his Scrubs and Fake Doctors, Real Friends co-star Zach Braff to play Booster's best friend, Blue Beetle.
But would Braff even want to do it?
Thankfully for all Blue and Gold fandom, ScreenRant.com writer Nathan Graham-Lowery put the question to Braff directly.
ScreenRant: Now, what are the chances we can get you to re-team up and you can play Booster's best friend, the Blue Beetle, Ted Kord?
Zach Braff: That's what I heard. I heard rumors, and I know nothing about comic books, but when Donald got this part, my social media blew up with 'You got to play Ted Kord now'. Now I don't know who Ted Kord is. I'm sorry, comic book fans, but I would love to play Ted Kord. You can start the rumor. I'm down to play Ted Kord. I don't know anything about Ted Kord, but I'll do it.
That might sound crazy, but having no idea who your character is seems to be exactly what casting agents for the Arrowverse are looking for.
I look forward to seeing a Faison/Braff television reunion... should Legends of Tomorrow ever actually be renewed for an 8th season.
(According to TVLine.com, LoT is one of 12 current CW shows that have not yet been renewed or officially canceled yet. Apparently, the CW's parent companies [Paramount and WarnerMedia] are trying to sell the network, and conventional wisdom is that executives are waiting to see what their new parents have in mind before making any more commitments. I guess we'll see what we see whenever we see it.)
Comments (0) | Add a Comment | Tags: donald faison legends of tomorrow nathan graham-lowery screenrant.com television zach braff
Friday, March 11, 2022
Cameo Appearance at the White House
If you watched The Flash season 8 episode "Impulsive Excessive Disorder" on Wednesday night, you must have seen this:
Nicole Drum provides a recap of Booster's appearance at ComicBook.com, but the article fails to mention that the White House visit is clearly a nod to Booster Gold's comic book origin story (as told in Booster Gold #8 and #9).
Meanwhile, over at EW.com, Chancellor Agard got the behind-the-scenes story of how the cameo came to be directly from Flash showrunner Eric Wallace:
"It was just a kind of a fun coincidence," he tells EW. "I was in post working on episode 806 and I knew the kids, Bart and Nora, would be looking at future things in the Flash Museum. And the head of post for our show and for Legends is the same person, Geoff Garrett. He happened to mention, 'Oh, by the way, don't tell anybody, but Booster Gold is going to be appearing in the finale of Legends.' I'm big Booster Gold fan, and I went, 'Hey, have they cast that person yet? I have a crazy thought. What if we see our kids in this episode looking through newspapers and we see whoever you guys have cast really fast, kind of a connected thing?' And he said, 'Well, it's funny you should mention that, Eric, because the finale of Legends airs the week before Flash returns.'"
Wallace continues: "So we made a few calls. I called up Phil [Klemmer], the showrunner of Legends, pitched him the idea. After he stopped laughing so hard he's like, 'Of course, definitely do that.' And then it was a very simple matter of just talking to the actor Donald Faison and getting his permission just to use a picture. He was into it. Next thing you know, it's in the show. It all happened in literally 24 hours. It was hilarious."
Now that Donald Faison's Booster has been in two "Arrowverse" CW shows two weeks in a row, I'm starting to wonder if this isn't the beginning of a trend? I sure hope so. Personally, I'd like to see Booster Gold on every television show every day; I just can't get enough of that guy.
Comments (0) | Add a Comment | Tags: chancellor agard comicbook.com donald faison eric wallace ew.com flash geoff garrett nicole glum phil klemmer television
Friday, March 4, 2022
People Are Talking, Talking About People
Whether or not I'm a fan of CW's programming, I have to admit that Donald Faison's portrayal of Booster Gold on DC's Legends of Tomorrow season 7 finale has certainly raised the profile of the character and introduced him to a whole bunch of people who have never actually set their hands on a DC comic. That's an objectively good thing.
So it is a worthwhile experience to read how the show's executive producer Phil Klemmer finally got around to adding Booster to his long-running show.
Here he speaks to Chancellor Agard for ew.com:
EW: Arrowverse boss Greg Berlanti has reportedly been working on a Booster Gold movie for years. How did the character wind up on Legends?
Klemmer: As you might expect, through the side door you'd least expect it [to]. I just remember [co-showrunner Keto Shimizu] and I were on a call with Kim Roberto at DC, and we were just talking about fun characters. I think somebody threw it out there, of course never [imagining] in a million years would we get Booster Gold. And then it felt like 15 minutes later, DC called us back and was just like, "Hey, Booster's yours." And just you have a moment of being like, "Okay, this is clearly a prank of some sort, because..." We were all giddy and in disbelief and then it just became a quest of finding an actor who was worthy of the character.
EW: Why was Booster Gold on your mind to begin with? Were you just looking for a DC character to bring in at the end of the season? How did Booster end up fitting the needs of the story?
Klemmer: It's always the tonal fit and just knowing, I don't know, there's just something so lovable and unexpected. You just knew that he was going to work as kind of a bit of the merry prankster, a bit of a BS artist.
Klemmer was also quizzed by Joshua Lapin-Bertone at DCComics.com:
DC: How familiar were you with Booster before this?
Klemmer: I just knew about him from the early days of Legends, when I would hear of various projects, whether they were TV shows or movies, in the same halls where I was working. And obviously dealing with Rip Hunter in early seasons as well. I just assumed that he was going to have his own project. I never imagined that he would come into our world.
DC: For building this version of Booster, did you draw upon any particular stories? Or did you build him from the ground up?
Klemmer: The creation of a character really takes place over the course of that first season, and then seasons to come. It's going to really be a correspondence between us as writers and Donald as a performer. We definitely wanted someone who is a little off center, and like, a little bit mischievous. But we also just wanted a charisma bomb.
And we round out our media tour with Klemmer's conversation with Damian Holbrook of TVInsider.com:
TV: Is the plan to keep Donald on the board?
Klemmer: For sure. We're not gonna let Booster get away. I'm really excited to write him—he's the kind of character you wish you could be. You could get away with murder and be so charming that you never really have to suffer the consequences. He's the antithesis of a writer. Writers are deeply neurotic and self-loathing self-doubting, etcetera. I think that's why we writers are drawn to those characters—because those are our secret alter egos.
Season 8 has not yet been announced. Will there be another season of Legends of Tomorrow? If I were a betting man, I'd bet yes (especially if Michael "Booster" Carter is on the field). Legends of Tomorrow is one of the few CW shows that has improved its ratings season-over-season, so I think we should prepare to see more of Klemmer and Faison's Gold come fall.
Comments (0) | Add a Comment | Tags: chancellor agard damian holbrook dccomics.com donald faison ew.com greg berlanti interviews joshua lapin-bertone legends of tomorrow phil klemmer tvinsider.com
Wednesday, March 2, 2022
Legends of Tonight
According to my television guide, the season seven finale of DC's Legends of Tomorrow debuts tonight at 8PM Eastern.
You may recall that this is the episode that will introduce Donald Faison's mystery character who very well might be the Berlanti Arrowverse's version of Booster Gold. Or, at least some version of him, as Legends of Tomorrow leans heavily into the DC Multiverse.
Anyway, tonight's the night, Booster boosters. So tune in and see what you think. You know I will.
"The Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie Show" is the second best Simpsons episode ever. Fight me.
UPDATE: Yep, Donald Faison is Booster Gold, all right. If the show is renewed for a season 8, it sure looks like we'll be getting more.
Side note: The episode is *not* designed for viewers who are not already intimitely familiar with the series. So if you're watching DC Legends of Tomorrow for the first time — or in my case, the second time in 7 years — may God have mercy on your soul.
Second side note: If you're looking for my opinion, I didn't hate it. I didn't love it, either, but, hey, I'm more of a Comic Book Guy anyway. Faison certainly had the right energy, I'll give him that, and I won't be bothered at all if they bring him back for more episodes. I might even be persuaded to watch them.
Comments (5) | Add a Comment | Tags: donald faison legends of tomorrow rumors television
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