BREAKING NEWS: Flashpoint Set Plays Host to Important Government Announcement, and Other News Tidbits!

I have to post a quickie Flashpoint update since something major was announced today.

Canadian Government to Attempt to Fix Canadian Television Fund

Most TV production in Canada receives funding from the Canadian Television Fund , which is supported by contributions from the Canadian Government (through the Department of Canadian Heritage) and many Canadian Cable and Satellite providers. In the last few years, the fund has undergone many changes in how it is supported by its supporters, especially since many supporters pulled out or reduced their funds by a significant amount. This compounded with the rise of "new media" over the internet and mobile devices, has sent the distribution of these funds into a tizzy, leaving many in the TV industry frustrated. The Canadian New Media Fund, which was created for this purpose, also suffered from lack of Governmental support. Today, Heritage Minister James Moore held a press conference from the set of Flashpoint announcing the merger of the two funds to create the Canadian Media Fund which will come to fruition in 2010 (Image Credit: CTV). Applicants will be required to make their content available on two platforms. While we are happy to read that the Government is attempting to reorganize their TV industry funding , we were a little confused about what developers who only work on either conventional programming or new media would have to do to get funding under these new requirements. Brian Anthony of the Director's Guild of Canada also shared his sentiments on the same thoughts exactly. And the Canadian Actor's Union, ACTRA, has a few words to say too, since 5 of the 7 members of this new board are comprised of representatives from the "Big Cable" industries. In recent years, we've noticed there has been a rise of many independent productions in Canada, especially animated ones which are almost web-exclusive. It would be a sad day to see these productions struggle to get funding, as well as having to really fight to get funding from a board more balanced towards bigger companies. While we were happy to read that they chose to make this announcement from the set of one of Canada's biggest TV successes of recent years, we can't help but worry about how exactly this consolidated fund is going to work. Readers who want to check out videos from the press conference (and take a guess exactly where in Toronto the set is!) can go to CTV and watch them on their media player.

☽ And Zap2It has some really cool pictures of the cast of Flashpoint and Numb3rs on an on-set weapons training visit! Enrico Colantoni and Hugh Dillon traveled to Burbank to use a Firearms Training Simulator.

☽ And we have ratings to report: io9 posted an interesting article and poll asking the question "Is there too much to watch on Friday Nights?" I at least had that problem between three shows this week. Flashpoint, Dollhouse, and I also really wanted to catch 20/20 since they were going to feature the farewell performance of Siegfried and Roy. I'm still amazed at how Roy Horn has recovered from his injury, and also amazed at his strength. I ended up watching Flashpoint, and recording the other two shows. Did any of our readers also have this dilemma? In any case, I have lost all faith in Dollhouse. This time I really felt that the banter read right out of a script from Buffy, and that Sierra's part in the episode was just there for a token appearance. Most TV critics are predicting it won't last past these 13 episodes, and I am siding with them. I don't think it's a threat to Flashpoint anymore. Flashpoint had one of the most suspenseful and gripping episodes in its run last week, and I thought the lines of the nanny were brilliantly written and the child stars were superb (we bet they thought it was cool to see all the behind the scenes action and effects)! The other really cool thing about this episode is that the viewers who have been following this show now have a really good idea where each character comes from and they can almost feel their thoughts in their head when they don't have anything to say. You could feel Sam Braddock's heartbreak when Donna walked in, and you could feel Greg Parker remembering what it was like to be there for his son when he gave Daniel a reassuring hug after his captor had been shot. Stephanie Morgenstern and Mark Ellis in one of their beginning promotional interviews said that this wasn't your typical cop show - and every week they live up to it! Anyway, enough gushing about the episode, we were so happy to read this week Flashpoint creamed Dollhouse in the United States! Flashpoint scored 9.8 million viewers and a 2.0/6.0 score with the 18-49 demographic, whereas Dollhouse scored only 3.50 million viewers and a 1.5/5.0 with the same demographic. 20/20 had the same score in the demographic but only had 8.40 million viewers. Flashpoint definitely won the timeslot and CBS won the night! Next week's episode features Sam Braddock in a hostage situation - we can't wait!

Our Moon is Still Rising, Two Years Later!

Today marks the 2nd anniversary of Moon Chase! We’d like to thank all our fans for their support, even when times have been tough and we haven’t been able to update as often as we would like to. To all the sites in the last year who have linked us - thank you! We’d love to add you to our sidebar too so please let us know who you are! We’re just about at 65,000 hits! This week, we’ll hopefully have a couple surprises for you the return of commercials (and oh boy are there a lot), and a special surprise we’ve been promising for a really long time is finally going to be added to this site! Thanks again for your support and watch this space!

Pretty Cure - First Dubbed Episode Review!

Three Cheers for Toei For Getting Everything Right!

I did a rough review this morning, running a subtitled episode against the dubbed episode on my television (not an easy thing to do!) and it's posted after the jump.

All in all, there were less edits made in this first episode compared to the edits in the first episode of Sailor Moon. One of the hallmarks of Sailor Moon was the background music which was changed in entirety just for the English dub - the original music was all kept for Pretty Cure, and it sounds a lot clearer when compared to the DVD releases of Sailor Moon. From what we have learned, Toei is handling this series instead of 4Kids, much to the relief of fans everywhere! It seems though that promotion is running a little behind for the series. YTV hasn’t featured it in any newsletters in the last few weeks, and promotioanl pieces just started to hit the industry mags yesterday. The show wasn’t even promoted by its parent company in their March Highlights! So Canada, let’s try to be a lot more supportive with this effort from Toei and watch the show when you can okay? The quality of this dub will probably even satisfy you hardcore Pretty Cure fans! Toei has put subtitled episodes of the show for free viewing on Crunchyroll.

The new voices aren’t as cutesy as they are in the Japanese version, but they work! Barely any difference between the original and this one in terms of scripts. Opening titles changed slightly, and we love the girly punk theme song! They even used similar lyrics in some places to the original theme. Episode title screens still the same and the translation is close. They have kept the Junior High School Names the same. Looks like they have kept all the original music and it’s been mastered pretty well. Names have been changed into English, but that was expected. Hannah’s crush plays for the baseball team (instead of a kendo team in the original). They have certainly done a good job of adapting this to school life in the western world while still retaining most of the original’s lines. They made one change during the conversation on the train - in the original, one of the friends says that Hokona/Hannah and Nagisa/Natalie would work well together because Nagisa is popular with boys and Hokona is popular with girls. In the dub, she says that it’s “the best of both worlds” since Hannah is good at school and Natalie is good at sports. Playing it safe there, eh Toei? Again, an edit we understand completely (though we are kinda reminded slightly of the issues with Haruka and Michiru). Hannah’s dog is named Chuutaro! Another slight change in the scene where Natalie’s mom asks her brother to go check on her. In the original, there is a lot of noise and her mom asks him to go check up on her. In this one, she asks him to go up to tell her dinner will be late tonight. The writers got rid of Mepple’s end-sentence trademark “Mepo”! Pissard’s name is Pichard now. Somehow I can just picture Roland Parliament’s voice as being perfect for Mepple if he toned up his Melvin just a little! Fans will be happy to know that the henshin hasn’t been digitally altered in any way! And they have kept the whole Emissary speech... this is bringing back fond memories of Sailor Moon for me and probably will for the rest of us watching this show. Our monster of the day’s name isn’t that decipherable? Hakenna? It sure doesn’t sound like Zakenna. The voice is all warped. The name of the attack has been changed from “Pretty Cure Marble Screw” to “Pretty Cure Marble Twister”. “Mipo” is gone too. The credit screens are different than the Japanese. I don’t recognize any names in the credits with respect to Sailor Moon. The Ocean Group has produced this dub, and it is being recorded at Blue Water Studios in Calgary Alberta. The show is also only airing one episode a week (twice on Fridays, once on Saturdays). The episode previews have also been kept, and it’s nice to see the Toei Animation Cat at the end of the episode.

Flashpoint News Roundup!

Who caught tonight's episode? What a twist and a sad ending :(. I quite enjoyed the banter between the SRU in the workout room in the beginning! Leave us your thoughts below!

Flashpoint Nominated for More Awards

Unfortunately, the show didn't win the award it was nominated for at the CFTPA Indie Awards (Season 2 of Intelligence won). Sarah Gadon, who played Tasha in the episode Attention Shoppers, was nominated for an ACTRA Toronto award, but unfortunately didn't win either (we really loved her performance in it too :(). On a side note, Robert Tinkler (Rubeus, Pupuran) was also nominated for his voice work on Cyberchase (and also didn't win). Flashpoint however it has other award noms on the horizon! Two episodes have been nominated for the Writers Guild of Canada's Screenwriters Awards! And they are: Tracey Forbes for Attention Shoppers and Adam Barken for Who's George?. The show is against episodes from ReGenesis and Murdoch Mysteries. The Awards will be held on Monday, April 20th - we wish Flashpoint the best of luck!

IGN Posts Interview with Enrico Colantoni

We're just going to link you to this one with a warning that Enrico Colantoni uses some nasty words in this interview that are censored. We recommend all our readers who are old enough to read this check it out - he gives out a lot of hints about the new season and also what it's like behind the scenes. He talks about how he feels a certain kinship to the show since his brother was a cop. At the end of the interview he makes special note about how the show is "allowed to be in Toronto" and how relieved the crew is to not have to hide certain things that are "Canadian", and how the show has been able to adapt and become a city that could be anywhere in the world. We especially like how there has been such a variety in the different cultures of the characters on the show.

And Finally, Last Week's Canadian Ratings...

We are so elated to read on BBM that Flashpoint has risen! The show went up from having 910K viewers the week before to having 1.339 viewers last week - rising from the 24th most watched program to the 12th most watched program in Canada! We can all breathe again and hopefully the show will rise even more! Keep watching the show, Canadian fans!

Holy Moon Craters, Pretty Cure Starts on YTV Today!

... And I'm watching it right now - it's always a bad sign when you think you're too late to notice these things! I was going through my onscreen guide to get to the weather channel and noticed it, and coincidentally I was planning to write up something on Pretty Cure's success in comparison to Sailor Moon this weekend. The series has a 6th season in the works and most news articles are pointing out the fact that it is as successful (if not more?) than Sailor Moon. Turns out today was, in fact, the North American Television Premiere! Don't worry, it will re-air in a few hours on YTV! So far I'm impressed (though I missed the first ten minutes), and there are a lot of similarities to Sailor Moon! Oh wow, episode previews - guess they had to make the episode longer somehow (who here remembers Sailor Says?). . . Anyway, I think Canadian fans should give this series a chance - it's a Toei Series and they are going through Ocean Studios over Optimum Productions, and it's also a magical girl series. If we keep up the ratings, hopefully that will give Toei some faith that there's still a market for magical girl anime on TV.

Why Didn't Sailor Moon Get A Theme Park?

I swiped this magazine from an office years ago, and thought to save it for otaku information later on. Since this is a hectic week and we are once again in a "filler episode phase", I figured, why not post it?

In 2005, Aichi Prefecture, Nagoya, Japan, played host to the 2005 Expo. The Expo is one of the biggest events aimed at bringing the world together through exhibitions. That year's theme was "Nature's Wisdom" which meant pavilion themes had to have something to do with the wonders of nature, and eco-friendliness. And there were some cute critters for mascots, Kiccoro and Morizo. Moon Chase favorite Ayumi Hamasaki performed an orchestral version of A Song is Born at the opening ceremonies. However, one thing that has remained constant and popular for several years, just HAD to be featured. A special Pokemon-themed park was built just for the Expo, and the magazine had a small feature on it, including a picture of a Pikachu themed ride. Is there any facet of the entertainment industry the Pokemon have not made an attempt to conquer? We wondered what the theme park might have been like if it was Sailor Moon themed. What rides and attractions would you have liked to see? Share your ideas in the comments! We've scanned the feature for you below.

Flashpoint Ratings Febraury 27th, 2009

Hi Moonies: We're going to hold off on our summaries of the episodes until further notice. They will be done, just when is hard to say, we are doing a little restructuring behind the scenes. Nonetheless, we will keep you posted on the ratings since Flashpoint is in a bit of a bind on both sides of the border!

First off - it was announced last week that CTV , Flashpoint's parent network in Canada and initial supporter, is projecting a loss of 100 million CAD in "conventional television" due to the worldwide economic crisis, along with changes in television and how the internet has influenced media content. CTV has also written off 1.7 billion CAD in television operations from the last quarter. The network also suspended Canadian Idol just for 2009. We are worried that Flashpoint may have to pull in successful numbers consistently if the show were to be considered for a third season - it will need to prove it will be a good investment. And the ratings in Canada have been declining slowly. On the 13th of February, when the last episode of Season 1 Between Heartbeats aired, the show had 1.292 million viewers - a significant cry from the 1.7 million viewer peak two episodes earlier. So Canadian Moonies - please try to watch this show on Friday night (who wants to go out in the cold anyway?) and encourage anyone else you know to give this show a try!

Now, onto last week's episode, Business as Usual. Canadian ratings won't be posted for a few more days, however the US ratings were published just hours after the show aired. Flashpoint kinda won and didn't win it's timeslot. It had more viewers than Joss Whedon's Dollhouse with 9.17 million viewers (to 4.13 million) however, Dollhouse scored a 2.0/7.0 score with the 18-49 demographic, and Flashpoint was kept away from the top only scoring 1.9/7.0. As far as the shows went, Flashpoint came back with a bang with a story about how the current economic crisis and corporate greed affects everyone, however I thought the scenes with the new character, Donna Sabine (at least we think that's her last name) were a little rushed. Maybe the vagueness of her persona will be clarified as the show goes on, and it was there to add to the mystery of her psychological problems which were hinted at. I really liked the mock stock exchange they had built in MaRS though, and it was nice to see Amy Jo Johnson, even if it was only for a few minutes (she will be back, right?). Dollhouse on the other hand, stuck to one plot for the entire episode's duration, however at times it seemed to drag on and on. I didn't quite believe Eliza Dushku's singing was as great as the show made it out to be, or the Diva's behaviour seemed overdone at times. I also thought some elements for the plot for this episode was drawn from an episode of Eliza's other show Tru Calling, many years ago. I also don't think Friday night is necessarily the greatest night for both of these shows. The good news is that these two shows are the top two in the timeslot, and it will be interesting to see in the coming weeks how this plays out.