No matter whose side you’re on (c’mon, we’re all on Ash’s side), Ash Vs. Evil Dead fans will still be pleased to learn that the show returns for its second season on October 2. Bruce Campbell as Ash Williams and Lucy Lawless as Ruby continue to lead the cast, but will be joined this year by the Six Million Dollar Man himself, Lee Majors, as Ash’s father, as well as Ted Raimi and Michelle Hurd. The show promises to be “bloodier and gorier than ever before”; cast members at TCA reported on improved blood and gore delivery systems, as well as the gallons of fake blood on set. Hurd cautioned, “This is a ferocious season.” But perhaps even more exciting is Campbell’s unbridled glee over the man playing his father. “Look at this!” he enthusiastically asked the TCA crowd, gesturing to himself and Majors. “Perfect casting, right?”
In other Starz news announced at today’s panel by president and CEO Chris Albrecht, The Girlfriend Experience, executive produced by Steven Soderbergh and based on his movie of the same name, has been greenlit for a second season. However, this new season, “will focus on entirely new characters and plot lines.”Way to vague it up, Starz press release!
Jamie Fraser fans can also breath a huge collective sigh of relief, as Outlander has been renewed through books three and four, and could go even longer, depending on when Albrecht gets around to reading books five and six. Its return was “just as buzzy as ever,” and Albrecht “couldn’t be more proud of the show.”
The fourth and final season of Black Sails brings the series to the shores of Treasure Island, just as the showrunners originally intended. Power, which Albrecht describes as one of the most “diverse series both in front of and behind the camera” has been confirmed through season five. Albrecht says that the Antonio Banderas project Havana Quartet is “in the house” and “under consideration,” hoping to shoot in Cuba.
In future Starz news, Power star Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson is developing a new superhero series called Tomorrow, Today, based on his own screenplay. Other upcoming series include Teresa, based on the award-winning Mexican telenovela of the same name, and Dirty Girls Social Club, based on the best-selling novel by Alisa Valdes, about a group of female friends 10 years past college. Hopefully the women of Pussy Valley will also have some friendships to depend on, as the scripted drama will offer “an unflinching and unapologetic look at the lives of pole dancers working down in the Dirty Delta,” leaving some of the reporters in the TCA crowd to question whether they would be able to print the title of the series in their respective newspapers.