JJ Abrams is making another sci-fi TV show and he is bringing one of his Star Trek stars on board. Today it was announced that Karl Urban will be starring in Abrams show Human on Fox. More details below. Plus there is news on Benedict Cumberbatch’s future with Sherlock. [UPDATE: Enterprise star John john Billingsley cast in CBS drama.]
Karl Urban is the Human in ‘Human’
JJ Abrams is putting together a new futuristic show for Fox called Human. The show set in the near future focuses on a pair of LAPD detectives, in a near future where human detectives are paired with "highly evolved human-like androids." The show will focus on one of these detective pairs and now TV Line is reporting that Karl Urban (aka Star Trek’s Dr. McCoy) has been cast as the human cop. From the article:
Urban will play John Kennex, a respected police officer who has shut down emotionally after a tragic mission left him critically injured. He is paired with Dorian (Common Law‘s Michael Ealy), an android detective who, ironically, has a better grasp of humanity than he does.
Abrams is joined by his Fringe colleague J.H. Wyman as executive producers for Human. The cast also includes Minka Kelly (Friday Night Lights), Lili Taylor (Six Feet Under), Michael Irby (The Unit) and Mackenzie Crook (Pirates of the Caribbean).
Karl Urban to star in new JJ Abrams futuristic cop show "Human"
Cumberbatch confirms 4th Season of Sherlock
In other Trek star on TV news, Into Darkness baddie Benedict Cumberbatch tells the Radio Times that he and his co-star Martin Freeman are signed up for a fourth season of the critically acclaimed BBC/PBS show Sherlock. Cumberbatch also said that he would "love" to see the show continue beyond the fourth season.
Shooting for Season 3 of the series is set to begin on May 18th and is expected to air on the BBC in the fall (no time set for yet for PBS).
Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman have at least two more seasons of Sherlock in their future
UPDATE: Billingsley Cast In CBS Drama ‘Intelligence’
There is even more Star Trek celebrity pilot season casting news. Deadline is reporting that Star Trek: Enterprise’s Dr. Phlox has been cast in the CBS drama pilot Intelligence. The new show is centered at U.S. Cyber Command and focuses on an agent (Josh Holloway) who has been implanted with a microchip that allows him access to the entire electromagnetic spectrum. Billingsley will play Dr. William Crispin, a top computer neuroscientist formerly at the U.S. Cyber Command unit.
John Billingsley cast in new new CBS pilot "Intelligence"
Thanks to David for the tip
Some other good news. Hopefully we will soon see both the new Sherlock and Human series here soon. Good on ya, Karl!
Dammit! This settles it! The only way that JJ can do all these projects — ST, SW, this Urban production, is to clone himself. In fact, how the heck do we know he hasn’t already?
Both these bits of news have made an ‘ol lady very happy :-) I’m like Snoopy doing his happy dance!
Wow the show is just like “Condor”
Actually, on second thoughts, the cop show sounds a bit like the show Joey was in, in ‘Friends’, called ‘Mac and C.H.E.E.S.E.’ Cheese stood for Computerized Humanoid Electronically Enhanced Secret Enforcer. Hmm….
5: I was also thinking the Mac & Cheese fake show from Friends.
Of course, images of Data come to mind….
What’s old is now new.
God bless us, every one.
If you haven’t given Sherlock a try please do…you will not be disappointed….Cumberbatch in the role is …..ummmm…..fascinating.
SPOILER!
Still awaiting the explanation of surviving the “fall”..although Im pretty certain the clue lies in an otherwise unessecary scene..
Detective Kleenex.
Blowing away the bad guys.
The new TV show sounds like the plot for the movie version of I, Robot. Sort of.
All you guys are kids. “Mac & Cheese”. That was just a few years ago.
I remember a show called “Holmes and Yo-Yo” starring the Klingon Ambassador himself: John Schuck as the police android. Lasted a season in the mid ’70s.
Now get off my lawn!
@11. Simon
Are you in that film ‘Up’? :-)
@11
Wow…I also remember that show…it was horrible! lol
Nice lookin’ lawn you got there!
Karl Urban in a futuristic cop show? He kinda done this before with the movie Dredd.
(My first comment was in reaction to the Karl news, not the Sherlock news. Just to clarify.)
I’m actually surprised at Karl taking on a potential long-term project filmed in Vancouver, since he lives in New Zealand. I’m guessing that might have been part of the very long negotiations the news sites are mentioning. Nice of J.J. to think of him, though! I think they’ll be a good TV match.
“Mann & Machine”, “Holmes & Yoyo”, “Cops & Robin” and “Future Cop” seem to have covered this ground before along with Bova and Ellison’s short story “Brillo” …
So Sherlock starts shooting its new season 1 day after STID opens in the US. Coincidence or did the BBC schedule this specifically to allow Benedict to do the press tour for Star Trek?
The Human is a TV series. I do not know how many episodes the first series will contain. It is possible, though, that Karl may not be away from New Zealand any longer than he is doing film projects. Karl Urban has said that he already spends approximately six months of the year outside NZ doing film work, mostly in the US.
Just so long as he gets home for Christmas and the kiwi summer holidays (January) to have some good down home family time…
Oh Karl…been a fan since back in the Xena days.
As long as we’re bringing up prior human and robot detective pairings, I see nobody’s mentioned “Total Recall 2070” yet. Or Isaac Asimov’s R. Daneel Olivaw and Elijah Baley novels.
We need more SF on tv. I miss Stargate Atlantis. :(
Hmm. A detective paired with an android in the future and they solve crimes together? Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century?
Don’t forget FUTURE COP:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_Cop_(TV_series)
Which had the honor of Paramount and ABC being sued by Harlan Ellison for infringing on his copyrighted work, BRILLO which had been pitched by him and cowriter Ben Bova to Paramount for a TV series.
Ellison took some of the proceeds from winning that lawsuit and rented a billboard across from the ParaSuits offices: “Writers — Don’t Let Them Steal From You! Keep Their Hands Out of Your Pockets!”
@11
I was going to mention the exact same thing…!
It wasn’t a cop show but still the first thing I thought of was Roddenberry’s ‘Questor Tapes’.
Hope it’s good but Bad Robot should be working on a Trek show. Really.
@12 – got a couple years before that
@13 – thanks! ;-)
I’m just surprised I was the first to mention Yo-Yo since he was a TREK veteran actor. It’s the first thing I remember him from and never forgot the gag of Yo-Yo scanning a book in a couple seconds to read it completely. So whenever I saw John Schuck on TV or in a film after that show it was always “Hey, there’s Yo-Yo”.
I wish Karl was cast in Dredd 2
Billingsley will be a fine addition to the show. He’s a solid character actor and always good in these types of roles.
Urban is a good fit for that kind of show. He was solid in Dredd IMO. As far as a Dredd 2…seems unlikely at this point despite the fact that it has done really well in the home market.
Either way Dredd has already become a modern “cult classic” with a small, but growing, enthusiastic fan base. :]
10. and others…
‘Human’ sounds like a retread of Asimov’s Bailey and Olivaw books– Robots of Dawn, Caves of Steel, etc.
I wish Urban well. Hope it works out for him.
Oh yeah! Questor Tapes!
So, JJ makes a new show with a premise similar to an old Roddenberry show and casts an actor from his Star Trek. And it’s a cop show, which is how Roddenberry got into writing with writing cop shows.
Why not just create a new Star Trek show?
@31. Mad Mann-
Oh yeah indeed!
“Why not just create a new Star Trek show?”
I HAVE to believe that is in the works, said the ‘crazy’ to the ‘mad’. Bad Robot is doing it, I can feel it in my bones (pun intended)! The announcement will be made at some point in the future (pun unintended) and it will be a new Trek concept that will seem to spring from JJ’s forehead, Zeus-like, fully formed and will solidify his movie/television/scifi franchise godhood. ‘Look, listen, kneel, pray!’
But I’m a JJ fan and love what he’s doing. I want ALL that he has to give (of quality) and except for the ‘godhood/kneeling and praying’ I meant what I said. Looking forward to the inevitable new Trek series. Or would that be The Inevitable NuTrek Series? TINTS anyone?
It’s great to see these Trek stars do well in other shows…
Well, I sure look forward to seeing Mr Urban in this show, when I can access it.
Meanwhile, I really really hope that instead of stopping at #3, Trek movies continue thru at least #5. That would be so great.
I, too, would love to see a TV series, and hope I’m not too far afield to wish for the movie cast to reprise their roles. If it were, say, ten 90-minute eps per year, or fourteen 60-minute episodes, with quality production values, to be broadcast on AMC or other great-but-not-“premium” channel, I’d be, er, over the moon.
If it couldn’t be live-action, I’d hope for very high-quallity graphics and artistic values, with the new ST cast doing the voices. But I doubt it’d fly in a prime-time broadcasting slot, except among us Trek devotees.
#31. Mad Mann – March 13, 2013
It will be interesting to see if the earlier Ellison court win and BAD ROBOT’s obvious Paramount connection will cause Harlan to saddle up his legal team. BRILLO has a stronger connection to this property than QUESTOR.
If they were to do another Star Trek television series, I would like to be in this alternate universe, with hopefully all the main actors we see in the movies, playing their characters on the series.
I agree with Marja, as in making them 90 minute episodes, six in a series perhaps, much like what the BBC does with series like Sherlock. Quality over quantity – less is more…
@36. Keachick –
“If they were to do another Star Trek television series, I would like to be in this alternate universe, with hopefully all the main actors we see in the movies, playing their characters on the series.”
This alternate universe? Yes. And fewer and longer eps? Yes . But with all the movie actors? Highly unlikely. We’ll see. A show IS coming.
It seems that fans like Spock in ST:TSFS will find a way:
http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/03/13/veronica-mars-movie-is-a-go-kickstarter/
I wonder if Moonves can turn is back on that funding if it were raised for Trek?
Who in the hell is Veronica Mars?
As I have mentioned a number of times, I think Trek, following the third movie, could go strait to HBO for a return to TV…the scifi analogy to Game of Thrones. A 10-episode story arch each year; near-movie production values; and a healthy enough production budget that they could probably have the whole movie cast participate, except for Pine and Zaldana, who would unlikely be affordable (but could make guest appearances now and then).
I would greatly prefer this to some silly cartoon.
Officer Kleenex, wiping out crime…..
Dredd was such a spetacular hit, why not stick Urban into another law enforcement show, where he can play second fiddle to a robot. This is going to be canceled after about four episodes….there is no way network television will run hard sci-fi here, looking at how sentient AI is supplanting man at the top of the food chain. If you like Data, you will love Dorian….
#39. MJ – March 14, 2013
Critically acclaimed UPN teenage detective tv series that morphed into a CW property in UPN’s bankruptcy/merger, then fell off the air due to the CW’s cash strapped state. Enrico Colantoni played her (Kristen Bell) PI father/mentor.
It has a devoted fan base that mirrors the dedication of early Trek fans. The important historical difference being VM fans got their movie kick started by raising the 2 million dollars from amongst themselves.