Pop Culture Roundup Aug. 15, 2007

The BBC has season 2 details for "Torchwood."



Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman) is back and reunited with Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) when she teams up with Torchwood (BBC Two) to help them solve a series of mysterious deaths in Cardiff.

Pictured here as she steps into the Hub for the first time, a more grown up and worldly-wise Martha brings her medical knowledge and the expertise learnt during her travels with The Doctor to help Torchwood do battle against an alien threat.

Freema Agyeman says: "Martha has grown up a lot since Doctor Who. She's now a fully qualified doctor and a bit hardened by life experiences. When she finds out that Captain Jack needs her help, she joins Torchwood for a while. She continues to develop her knowledge of alien intelligence, but this time keeping her feet on the ground.

"These will be invaluable skills to take back with her on future adventures with The Doctor. She outgrew The Doctor, in a sense, and so the next time they meet it will be in a more professional capacity. I'm so proud of her journey and who she has become.

"And for me as an actress, it's a great new challenge to be able to broaden and expand Martha as she develops in other directions for this more adult series. The Torchwood team are fabulous to work with and have made me very welcome."

Creator of Torchwood, Russell T Davies says: "Freema is a wonderful actress and we want to give her the chance to add another dimension to Martha. She is going to cause some waves in the team – especially as she joins Torchwood at a point when everything is going to change for one of them."

Freema is one of many special guest stars appearing in the new series of Torchwood. Richard Briers is the latest to join the line-up, playing Parker, a reclusive millionaire who is the keeper of alien secrets, much later in the series. Alan Dale (Ugly Betty, Lost) and James Marsters (Buffy The Vampire Slayer) have also been confirmed.

The second series of Torchwood begins on BBC Two in the New Year and Martha will be starring half way through the series, appearing in three episodes.

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Esteemed Bat fan Sen. Patrick Leahy will appear in the next Batman film.

Leahy is apparently a big comic book enthusiast, and actually served as an extra in the 1997 Batman installment: Batman and Robin.

The senator told the station he can't reveal the exact details of his role in the upcoming movie, but he did say he has landed a scene with its two stars, Christian Bale and Heath Ledger.


Leahy also penned the foreward to DC Comics' "Dark Knight Archives Vol. 1." Plus, he occasionally sends the vice president into a foaming/cussing at the mouth rage, which makes him a bit of a superhero in his own right, as far as I'm concerned.

Best Batman sites.

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Preview pages from the new "James Bond Enclyclopedia."



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An upcoming Mick Jagger solo best-of CD features a previously unreleased duet with John Lennon.

"Too Many Cooks (Spoil the Soup)" features Jagger on vocals, the late Lennon on guitar and Lennon's fellow Beatle Ringo Starr on drums.

It was recorded in Los Angeles in 1973 and was produced by Lennon.


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A DVD set showcasing Jim Henson's pre-"Sesame Street" works is planned.

The DVD collection will be full of Henson's early experimental shorts, crazy commercials, television appearances, other rarities from the Henson vault and other retrospective goodies for Henson fans and historians to enjoy.

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The New York Times marks the 50th anniversary of Jack Kerouac's "On the Road."

The autobiographical, stream-of-consciousness “On the Road” follows Sal Paradise (a character based on Kerouac) and Dean Moriarty (based on Kerouac’s friend Neal Cassady) as they ramble back and forth across the country, drinking, listening to jazz and having affairs.

Viking is releasing a 50th-anniversary edition on Thursday (the original came out Sept. 5, 1957), and is also publishing, for the first time in book form, the original version that Kerouac typed on a 120-foot-long scroll and a new analysis by John Leland, a reporter at The New York Times, titled “Why Kerouac Matters: The Lessons of ‘On the Road’ (They’re Not What You Think).” The Library of America will include “On the Road” in a collection of Kerouac’s “road novels” to be published next month. And the New York Public Library will pay homage in November with an exhibition of the original scroll and other materials from the Kerouac archives.


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Dhani Harrison, son of George, and the Wu-Tang Clan are reportedly doing a cover of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps."

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