Hugh Grant denies being the new DOCTOR WHO

British newspaper reports have been swirling for several days that British actor Hugh Grant has been cast as the next Doctor Who. Grant shot down the reports today, confirming he had not been cast.

Speculation as to the identity of the next Doctor Who has been rampant ever since Thirteenth Doctor Jodie Whittaker confirmed she would be leaving last July, alongside showrunner Chris Chibnall. Both have been in place since 2018, producing three seasons and three New Year specials between them. Two more specials are due to air this year, the first possibly around Easter and the second around October.

Russell T. Davies, who previously resurrected the show back in 2005 and was in charge until he departed at the start of 2010, is returning as showrunner. The show is also moving to being an independent production at Bad Wolf Studios, rather than an inhouse BBC production, which should allow for more efficient spending and planning of the series.

There has been plenty of speculation over who the new Doctor could be, with musician Olly Alexander and actors Lydia West, T'Nia Miller, Michael Sheen and Rhys Ifans mooted. One of the more prominent and enduring rumours is that David Tennant, who played the Tenth Doctor between 2005 and 2010, may return in some fashion. This would be either for the 60th Anniversary Special in November 2023, or as the Fourteenth Doctor, with his unexpected return driving the plot for several episodes before he is replaced by a more permanent Fifteenth Doctor.

Hugh Grant is most famous for his starring roles in the comedies Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994), Notting Hill (1999), Bridge Jones's Diary (2001), About a Boy (2002) and Love Actually (2003). He also appeared in numerous costume dramas, such as The Remains of the Day (1993) and Sense and Sensibility (1995). Grant experienced a career lull in the late 2000s, but in the 2010s began rebuilding himself in against-type experimental roles, such as Cloud Atlas (2012). He returned to prominence with roles in Paddington 2 (2017), The Gentlemen (2019) and the TV series A Very English Scandal (2018) and The Undoing (2020).

At 61, Grant would be the oldest actor ever cast as the Doctor, six years older than William Hartnell and Peter Capaldi when they were cast (in 1963 and 2013 respectively). It is known that Davies envisages a tonal reset of the show upon his return, trying to recapture the "blockbuster" tone he brought to the property in 2005 but with a modern update. It does feel like casting an older Doctor might be against that, as compared to the likes of Tennant, Matt Smith and Christopher Eccleston, who were all younger and had something more of an action role. It's also unclear if Grant would want to interrupt his film career renaissance with an infamously punishing TV schedule that would lead him little time to pursue other projects.

The next series of Doctor Who is already deep in pre-production, with shooting expected to start in the near future, so presumably the new Doctor will be announced before then, as it'll be impossible to keep their identity secret once filming begins.

CD Projekt confirms a new WITCHER game is in development

CD Projekt have teased a new Witcher video game project, with the byline "The Witcher: A New Saga Begins."

Not much else is known about the project - especially since CDPR's own website has crashed, possibly due to traffic - but it appears to be a new, full game in the series, following on from the 2015 release of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, one of the most acclaimed CRPGs of all time.

Based on Andrzej Sapkowski's seven-book series (recently adapted for television by Netflix), the three Witcher games were released in 2007, 2011 and 2015 and have cumulatively sold over 50 million copies. The games act as a possible continuation of the novel series, featuring the further adventures of the Witcher, Geralt, his adopted daughter Ciri and the sorceresses Triss Merigold and Yennefer. The second expansion for The Witcher 3, Blood and Wine, released in 2016, acted as a conclusion and coda to the series.

The new game, possibly the start of a series, is not expected to focus on Geralt, and may allow players to create their own Witcher rather than forcing them to play a pre-generated character. The game also marks a major technical shift, with CDPR using Unreal Engine 5 as part of a "multi-year strategic partnership" with Epic Games, rather than continuing to develop their own propriety REDengine.

CDPR are continuing to refine, revise and develop Cyberpunk 2077, their SF CRPG which was released in a technically poor state in late 2020. Recent updates have improved the game and CDPR are working on several expansions to the game which they hope to release this year or in 2023.

No release date for the new Witcher project has been mooted, although CDPR did acknowledge the eight-year gap between announcing and releasing Cyberpunk 2077 was a huge mistake, and subsequent gaps between announcement and release will be shorter.

The Last Kingdom: Season 5

AD 917. Many years of peace have endured between the Saxons and Danes. However, the return of the vengeful Danish leader Brida, former lover and now sworn enemy of Uhtred, upsets the peace, as does the ambitions of King Edward of Wessex to finally unite all of England under his rule. Uhtred has to carefully manage politics and war as he seeks to restore the peace and find a safe haven for his family.

Over the course of five seasons, The Last Kingdom has secured its position as one of the most watchable, entertaining swords 'n' beards series on television. Adapting Bernard Cornwell's novel series of the same name, the show has used brisk pacing, an excellent cast and some epic battles (on a not-so-epic budget) to tell a story of stirring politics and war in 9th and 10th Century Britain.

The fifth season of The Last Kingdom is the last, adapting the ninth and tenth books in the series: Warriors of the Storm and The Flame Bearer. The final three books in the series have instead been replaced in the adaptation by a single TV movie, Seven Kings Must Die, to follow later this year or early next. The decision to end the series in a different way to the books makes a fair bit of sense. In the books, Uhtred is around 60 years old during the events of this season (the actor playing him is only 39) and in his seventies at the end of the series, so ending at this point is a reasonable decision, especially as the ending of the story here brings the entire series around in a satisfying full circle.

The season also integrates the plots of the two books together, so rather than a fairly obvious mid-season shift in gears, the story organically moves from one storyline to the other. In the first, various factions trigger an end to the Danish-Saxon peace, resulting in a renewed conflict which the major leaders don't really want. Uhtred is invaluable here as he free-wheels between the two camps, trying to maintain peace whilst finding those really responsible for the chaos. This evolves into a larger-scale story as King Edward takes advantage of an opportunity to take more power in England, giving Uhtred a window of opportunity to realise a lifelong dream.

The 10-episode season unfolds at a brisk pace, the cast is as strong as ever, and there's a melancholic air to proceedings as Uhtred tries to keep his family - now grown up, married or with commitments of their own - together in the face of their own wishes and the whims of history. The nicely nuanced characterisation of the previous season, which saw Aelswith move from an antagonist of Uhtred's to reluctant ally, continues and is improved upon here. The battles are also stronger than Season 4's, which were underwhelming.

There are weaknesses. Uhtred suffering a setback, getting annoyed and then winning an unlikely victory is a trope we've seen before. Adrian Schiller is a fine actor but making his Aethelhelm (the most obvious "enemy within" ever) the main antagonist of the second half of the series feels a bit drawn out. A forbidden romance between Edward and a noblewoman named Eadgifu (a fine Sonya Cassidy) starts strongly and then kind of stalls. Wihtgar (Ossian Perret) is an underwhelming secondary villain. The lack of ageing makeup for any of the actors in the series is also increasingly bizarre, reaching comical heights in scenes where Aelswith (28-year-old Elisa Butterworth) is in deep conversation with her daughter Aethelflaed (28-year-old Millie Brady) and granddaughter Aelfwynn (22-year-old Phia Saban). But from a production standpoint, I get why they wanted to minimise such things.

The fifth and final season of The Last Kingdom (****) is not perfect, but it delivers a rousing finale to an enjoyable run. The show is available to watch on Netflix now.

Next Esslemont MALAZAN novel gets a name change and delayed release date

The Ten Very Big Books Podcast has hosted an interview with Ian Cameron Esslemont, co-creator of the Malazan universe (with Steven Erikson). Esslemont confirms that his next Malazan novel, hitherto known as The Jhistal, is now called Forge of the High Mage.

In the Edelweiss Catalogue, the book's entry has been updated with the new title and a new release date: April 6, 2023. However, that date may just be a placeholder, with Esslemont saying in the interview that the book should be out "this year."

Last year, it was confirmed that Esslemont had sold over a million books and had been contracted for three more books in his Path to Ascendancy series - with Forge of the High Mage now serving as Book 4 - although it looks now like the release dates for all three were on the optimistic side of things.

Esslemont's colleague Steven Erikson is also writing two new Malazan novels: Walk in Shadow, the final book in The Kharkanas Trilogy, and No Life Forsaken, the second book in the Witness Trilogy.

Christopher Lloyd joins THE MANDALORIAN

Lucasfilm have cast legendary comedic actor Christopher Lloyd in the third season of The Mandalorian.

Lloyd is best-known for his co-starring role as Dr. Emmett Brown in the Back to the Future movie trilogy alongside Michael J. Fox (plus a cameo in A Million Ways to Die in the West), as well as his role on the sitcom Taxi (1978-83) and the films One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) and Clue (1985). He also starred as the villain in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock (1984) and has recently co-starred in the move Nobody (2021).

The third season of The Mandalorian is currently shooting and is expected to air later this year. Lucasfilm will launch Obi-Wan Kenobi on 25 May and Rogue One spin-off Andor in the meantime.

Star Trek: Discovery - Season 4

The USS Discovery has been upgraded and integrated into the Starfleet of the 32nd Century. As the crew continue trying to adjust to life a thousand years into their future, they also face a new threat: a vast storm of energy, capable of destroying entire star systems. The Discovery crew try to discover the source of the storm and how to communicate with those who created it...if that is even possible.

Star Trek: Discovery is the show that has, for three seasons solid, given with one hand and taken away with the other. Exemplary casting, some great ideas and some great effects are constantly undercut by murky writing, chunky exposition, most character development taking place offscreen, and people constantly busting into tears for no immediately discernible reason, before the story nosedives towards its end into incoherence.

Season 3 saw a small but sustained uptick in quality. Pleasingly, Season 4 continues with that upward trajectory. We are presented with a huge, "proper SF" mystery which Discovery and her crew have to tackle through scientific research and careful deliberation, as well as diplomacy when the scale of the problem becomes clear. The result is a break with the tendency of the first three seasons to resort to firing phasers and solving problems with explosions. There are still some action beats, but these are more restrained and more Star Trek-y, for lack of a better term, than previously. Early episodes dealing with the mysterious artefact and attempts to penetrate or disable it recall Star Trek: The Motion Picture's dealings with the alien cloud V'Ger.

The show makes better use of its ensemble cast. Prior seasons had been very firmly "the Michael Burnham Show" but this season brings other characters to the fore. Saru gets a new role and a potential relationship, Tilly gets a new job (better-suited to her than her role last season), Stamets and Culber have much less intense issues to deal with, and Booker gets his own storyline separate from Michael's. Even the lesser-known bridge crew get a few more scenes in the sun this season, and more of a sense of Discovery as a community which has often been achingly missing in prior episodes.

As the season unfolds, it develops several simultaneously-developing storylines. Diplomatic relations with United Earth and Vulcan form key parts of the story, with entire episodes dedicated to overcoming diplomatic hurdles without so much as a phaser in sight. It's like watching a stronger 1989 episode of TNG all over again. There's also the attempts to find and then make contact with the aliens, which tap into the spirit of 2016 movie Arrival, and a subplot revolving around new character Dr. Ruon Tarka (a splendid performance by The Expanse's Shawn Doyle) who becomes something of an antagonist, but an unusually fleshed-out one. Discovery has struggled more than most shows in making a story arc justify a full season, but here they succeed, dividing the season nicely into beats in the larger story.

Even making Michael Captain works much better than expected. As a constantly mutinous and insubordinate officer, her character never really made sense. As a more cooperative and instead "nontraditional" captain, recalling the off-kilter inventiveness of Captain Kirk, the character suddenly comes to life in a way she didn't in prior seasons. It also helps that she's now only whispering about a tenth of her lines rather than half of them.

Problems still remain: murky and unclear CGI, some rather unlikely coincidences and plot contrivances, the show suddenly making a big deal of characters you don't really know anything about because they've never had much development, and some occasional leaps in plot logic. But these are constrained and indeed minor compared to the previous seasons.

Season 4 of Star Trek: Discovery (****) is easily the best season of the show to date, with an intriguing central storyline which unfolds in a compelling manner, with solid characterisation and a renewed dedication to Star Trek ideals that was lacking in the first few seasons. The show retains some of its earlier problems, but significantly moderated. It may have taken a long time, but Discovery is finally starting to realise its potential. The season is available now in the USA via Paramount+ and on various platforms in other countries.

Doctor Who: Series 11 (Season 37)

The newly-regenerated Thirteenth Doctor crashes to Earth and makes new friends, beginning a new series of adventures in time and space.

The eleventh series of the revitalised Doctor Who aired in 2018 and marked the second major refresh of the show's creative team since the new show started airing in 2005. Jodie Whittaker became the first actress to canonically play the role of the Doctor, new companions were introduced, a new TARDIS set was built, a new filming style was adopted and Chris Chibnall took over as showrunner and head writer.

Chibnall's appointment caused consternation among Who fans. His work on Doctor Who itself had been highly variable in the past and his stint showrunning Torchwood was not particularly successful (resulting in Cyberwoman, one of the very worst episodes in the entire Doctor Who canon to date). However, some hope was raised due to the immense success of his critically-acclaimed mainstream drama, Broadchurch, also starring Whittaker.

The season opens with The Woman Who Fell to Earth, a busy episode which has to introduce both Whittaker's fast-talking Doctor and no less than three companions: Mandip Gill as Yasmin Khan, Tosin Cole as Ryan and Bradley Walsh as Graham O'Brien. It also sets up a recurring villain and a bunch of new format ideas, including a more epic filming style and new composer. For such a busy episode it does okay: the villain is a little bit silly and overwrought, but Sharon Clarke is excellent as Grace and the new companions all have a lot of promise. The Ghost Monument continues in this vein, with spectacular location shooting in South Africa and great guest actor support from Susan Lynch, Shaun Dooley and an underused Art Malik propping up a solid story about robots and a scavenger hunt, with the Doctor's missing TARDIS as the prize.

Rosa is the season's most notable episode, with the Doctor and her companions travelling to 1955 Alabama and meeting Rosa Parks. With two of the Doctor's companions being people of colour, it's a wrought episode balancing commentary on racism and social issues with an SF story of its own. There are splendid performances (particularly Vinette Robinson as Rosa) and a ticking sense of dread that doesn't come from aliens for once. However, the villain is quite spectacularly underwhelming and his motivations don't really stand up to scrutiny. The episode also struggles with balancing historical information with telling a strong narrative, rather than elegantly combining the two. It's good to see Who tackling a sensitive bit of history with the noblest of intentions, but the execution is flawed.

Arachnids in the UK is the season nadir, with the Doctor and team fighting alien spiders in Sheffield. What could have been a goofy, Russell T. Davies-esque lark turns into a painful slog in its second half. The Tsuranga Conundrum is better, with a stacked cast who have gone on to greater things (like Ted Lasso's Brett Goldstein), but the monstrous alien is inexplicably cute and the visuals don't really fit the horrible things it does, leading to an inconsistent episode.

Demons of the Punjab is the season highlight. Like Rosa it's taking a real historical event and mining it for story ideas and pathos. Unlike Rosa, the Partition of India is a much bigger event with lots of spaces to tell stories in it. The cast is absolutely outstanding, and the episode mixes the historical events with the SF elements much more successfully. One complaint is that the aliens are a bit too close to Testimony (from Twice Upon a Time) in their motivations.

Kerblam! feels like a 2007 Russell T. Davies script that's been dusted down and put into production, which is both good (it has a very winning RTD sense of charming whimsy) and bad (TV production in general and Who in particular have moved on from 2007). The analogies to Amazon are so on-the-nose it's painful and the eventual resolution is pat, but it is better-paced than most stories this season and the guest cast is solid.

The Witchfinders tries to be a gritty historical story about hunting down witches in early 17th Century Lancashire. However, it is let down by Alan Cumming's ridiculously hammy performance and the story not being anywhere near strong enough to support the length of the episode. After a promising start it runs out of steam and never regains it.

It Takes You Away starts off as a classic, creepy "haunted house" story centred on a rich performance by Ellie Wallwork as Hanne, before metamorphosing into a dimension-hopping lark and ending up as a surprisingly powerful reflection on grief and loss, with Bradley Walsh delivering his best performance as Graham. The shifts in tone and setting help overcome the pacing problems much of the season has struggled with, and the episode has a great atmosphere. I must admit the ending, where Hanne goes off with her father rather than him being arrested for child abandonment and neglect, is a bit odd though.

The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos is the season finale and easily the weakest finale since the show's return in 2005. The episode starts off a bit too reminiscent of The Ghost Monument and then brings back the underwhelming and very cheesy villain from The Woman Who Fell to Earth. Guest stars Phyllis Logan, Percelle Ascott and Mark Addy all do great work, but the episode ping-pongs between different ideas and never really settles down into a good rhythm. Still, some good vfx.

Christmas special Resolution sees the Thirteenth Doctor confronting the Daleks again, or in this case, just one Dalek. The episode channels Series 1's Dalek in how it depicts a single Dalek as a formidable foe and something to be feared (I guess their intelligence drops the more of them are in a room), with a great sense of escalating menace and good guest performances by Daniel Adegboyega and Charlotte Ritchie. I'm not in love with the idea of Daleks being able to survive outside their casings for so long, though, or their ability to use humans as puppets.

The eleventh series of Doctor Who (***) is a mixed bag, and possibly its weakest season since its return. The decision not to have an over-arcing story for the entire season is a good one, allowing each episode to focus on its main storyline, but this is hampered by several episodes having weak stories. Chibnall fails to strongly characterise the Thirteenth Doctor in a way that makes her stand out from her predecessors (beyond the obviously superficial) and the decision to have a regular cast of four, although a good one for filming practicalities (previous Doctors had complained about their absurd screen time resulting in serious exhaustion), also dilutes characterisation. Nobody is able to get good development because the episodes are too crammed. The actors are all great, but they're not the best-served by the scripts. There is also a recurring problem with pacing, with several episodes feeling repetitive, leaden and drawn-out over far too long a period.

Still, several solid episodes and the very impressive new filming style mean that the season is not a complete write-off. The season is available to watch on BBC iPlayer in the UK and on HBO Max in the USA.

11.1: The Woman Who Fell to Earth (***½)

11.2: The Ghost Monument (***½)

11.3: Rosa (***)

11.4: Arachnids in the UK (**)

11.5: The Tsuranga Conundrum (***)

11.6: Demons of the Punjab (****½)

11.7: Kerblam! (***)

11.8: The Witchfinders (**)

11.9: It Takes You Away (***½)

11.10: The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos (**½)

11X: Resolution (***)

Paul Wesley cast as Jim Kirk in STAR TREK: STRANGE NEW WORLDS

In a surprise move, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds has cast (or recast) the iconic role of James T. Kirk.

The role was originally played by William Shatner in 79 episodes of Star Trek (1966-69), 22 episodes of Star Trek: The Animated Series (1973-74) and seven feature films (1979-94), as well as in numerous adverts and video games. Chris Pine picked up the role in three additional movies produced by J.J. Abrams, and will do so again for a new movie due next year.

Actor Paul Wesley (The Vampire Diaries, Medal of Honor, Tell Me a Story) has been cast in the role and will debut in Season 2, which is already in production. However, whilst he will be playing James Kirk, he won't be playing Captain James T. Kirk. At this point in the Star Trek timeline, the captain of the USS Enterprise is Christopher Pike (Anson Mount), who should continue in that role for several more years. The nature of Kirk's early involvement on the Enterprise remains to be seen.

On Twitter, Wesley noted the bizarre coincidence of sitting next to William Shatner randomly on a commercial airline flight, just after his own trip to space.

Season 1 of Strange New Worlds debuts on Paramount+ in the USA on 5 May. Season 2 should follow next year.

MS. MARVEL unveils trailer and release date

Marvel have revealed that their Ms. Marvel TV series will debut on Disney+ on 8 June.

The series stars Iman Vellani as Kamala Khan, a young superhero fan (particularly of Captain Marvel) who gains her own set of powers and sets out to fight crime and bad guys, having to overcome objections from her family in the process. The series also stars Aramis Knight as Red Dagger, Saagar Shaikh as Amir Khan, Zenobia Shroff as Muneeba Khan, Mohan Kapur as Yusuf Khan, Matt Lintz as Bruno and Rish Shah as Kamran.

The six-episode series also acts as setup for the Captain Marvel sequel, The Marvels, due in February 2023.

Ms. Marvel will be the second Marvel TV show to air this year, after Moon Knight airs from 30 March to 4 May. She-Hulk will follow in the late summer and Secret Invasion at the end of the year.

RIP William Hurt

News has broken that American actor William Hurt has passed away at the age of 71.

Hurt was born in Washington, D.C. and developed a taste for acting in school. A studious and varied actor, Hurt is best-known for his appearances in films like Altered States, Body Heat and Gorky Park, which made him a much-in-demand actor in the 1980s. He had three consecutive Best Actor Oscar nominations (and one win) between 1985 and 1987, and worked widely on screen and on stage. However, he did experience some controversy when his Children of a Lesser God co-star and then-girlfriend Marlee Matlin accused him of sexual assault and bullying. Another former partner also accused him of abuse running from the late 1970s to the mid-1980s. He later apologised for his behaviour, blaming it on drug use.

In the 2000s he experienced a career resurgence through films like A History of Violence, A.I., Syriana and The Village. Also in 2000, Hurt played the role of Duke Leto Atreides in the SyFy mini-series version of Dune, a role previously played by Jurgen Prochnow (in David Lynch's 1984 feature film) and recently reprised by Oscar Isaac in the 2021 Denis Villeneuve movie.

In 2008, Hurt was an unlikely addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe when he played General Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross, debuting in The Incredible Hulk. He reprised the character in Captain America: Civil War, Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame and Black Widow.

One of Hurt's last roles was playing fictional science fiction writer Peter Cromwell in Peter, one of the most highly-acclaimed episodes of Apple TV's Mythic Quest.

He passed away on 13 March 2022 from complications arising from prostate cancer.