Jun 2, 2011



Trailer For Cinemax's Strike Back

Cinemax has released a trailer for their "new" original series Strike Back... and apparently it debuts much sooner than I thought: this summer!  (I'd assumed it was a fall show.)  "New" is in quotation marks because, as previously reported, this is actually the second season of the UK series Chris Ryan's Strike Back, which aired over there on the satellite network Sky.  But despite being the second season, it's got new stars and a new, more American format (ten hour-long episodes instead of three hour-and-a-half episodes).  Yet it's not a remake, as evidenced by the different UK trailer (below), which makes it clear (somewhat surprisingly) that Spooks/MI-5's Richard Armitage, who starred in the first season, is still involved.  (There they're calling the new series Strike Back: Project Dawn to differentiate it from the original.) However, it looks like he'll be sidelined in favor of the new actors (including an American lead, played by an Australian)... most likely because he's tied up down in New Zealand shooting two Hobbit movies.  (Luckily, that didn't stop Martin Freeman from continuing his UK TV show, though... and he's the star of The Hobbit!) It seems like a good arrangement to me: maintain continuity from the first series but make the second friendly to new viewers as well.  I imported the Region 2 DVDs of the original series and what I put on briefly looked good, but I still haven't had a chance to watch it in earnest.  I'll post a review when I do.  That said, I think the new Cinemax version looks cool, too!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Although Martin Freeman is THE Hobbit, as the dwarf leader Richard Armitage's role is also a main one. Filming on The Hobbit had a hiatus to accommodate Freeman returning to England to make 3 episodes of Sherlock 2, and at the same time Armitage did his "handover" shots for Strike Back 2 in Africa. There is no way he could have committed to a 10 episode series as well as doing The Hobbit.

Steve said...

Strike Back season 1 is solid. If anyone is a fan of Armitage on Spooks/MI-5, this is a chance to see him in full on Jack Bauer mode. And he's appropriately convincing as a full tilt action star with decent character development to keep it interesting.

darci said...

This combined with the second trailer (http://youtu.be/2ghk6iFdtqw) have me really psyched for the show. Heard nothing but good things about the UK version, and really interested in seeing Philip Winchester in this lead role...plus there's something about "Riot Rhythm" by Sleigh Bells (song in the 2nd trailer) that just gets me pumped!