A new clue about the series 7 premiere of Doctor Who has popped up, thanks to the schedule from the Media Guardian Edinburgh International Television Festival. The festival will be showing the first episode of the series between August 23 and August 25, and its still-unannounced television air date will likely follow in September.

Meanwhile, showrunner Steven Moffat has been talking up new companion Jenna-Louise Coleman, who will make her debut in this year's Christmas Special. Apparently, she's not like all the other companions, despite fitting the "young, attractive female" mold.

Moffat:

I'll answer you in the show about how it's going to be different. But because it is going to be different. It's going to be a shock, I think. In terms of the companions all being 'the same'—that's not as phony or artistically crap a thing to say as it sounds. What is the base group of people who would run away with the Doctor? They're all going to be a bit mad. A bit dislocated. Not happy with where they are. Are they yearning for outer space? They're going to be people who feel like they can take on the Doctor, who's quite an intimidating sort of person. So, they're going to be feisty—they're going to be all those things. He sort of defines the people who are going to travel with him.

Moffat has previously said that the new companion's identity will be quite a shocker and "one of the biggest mysteries the Time Lord ever encounters," so there's definitely more to the story than "she's a bit mad."

Looks like we'll have to wait until Christmas to find out what it is, though.

[nerdbastards.]

First cast photo from Eric Kripke and J.J. Abrams' upcoming post-apocalyptic drama, Revolution, which was just picked up by NBC for a premiere season.

The series, written by Kripke and produced by Abrams, finds Billy Burke, Giancarlo Esposito, Andrea Roth, Tracy Spiridakos, Graham Rogers and Anna Lise Phillips in a world without electricity. Lights, phones, cars and the Internet are pretty much out of the question.

But ... but ... how will they watch Game of Thrones?! Sounds like a nightmare to me.

[blastr.]

The Game of Thrones season 1 Blu-ray includes a series of excellent animated history lessons that fill viewers in on the backstory of the houses of Westeros, the Night's Watch, Mad King Aerys and more.

Even better, they're all online (for now, anyway) and an industrious YouTuber has put them all in a playlist for your perusal.

[io9.]

It's common knowledge that Stan Lee has cameos in most of the Marvel movies (what's up with him not being in Punisher: War Zone?), but now Lee's cameo has crossed over into the animated universe. Lee pops up in the May 6th episode of Ultimate Spider-Man where Spidey has to fight the Hulk.

[seattlepi]

The CW's Green Arrow TV series, Arrow, is now considered a "lock" to be picked up for a first season, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

The network sees the Stephen Amell-starring series as a replacement for popular superhero drama Smallville, and it will reportedly be a "dark and gritty" take on the Green Arrow story.

We should know more soon. Network upfronts -- where studios begin showing off the pilot episodes of their promising new shows -- are due to start in two weeks.

[blastr.]

The cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation reunited over the weekend at the Calgary Comic & Entertainment Expo, and the highlight of their panel was a heartfelt speech from Wil Wheaton about his decision to leave the show.

Wheaton:

I left Star Trek: The Next Generation when I was 18-years old and initially I thought it was a really smart business career move. In some ways it was and in more ways it wasn't. What I wasn't prepared for was how much I was going to miss the people on this stage and how much I was going to miss the spacesuit that I hated wearing and the helmet hair, that I couldn't stand putting on.

Wheaton's admission ended with hugs all around and a little bit of ribbing from LeVar Burton, who said, "To tell you the god's honest truth, you were a pain in the ass, but I'm glad you're here, because you're our pain in the ass."

Writing about the event on his blog, Wheaton said, "After twenty years, I finally got to say this."

[treknews.]

MIT's campus hackers are on a roll. On top of turning an entire building into a giant game of Tetris, they've also erected a monument to the universe's superior beings, the Daleks.

A giant replica of the iconic Doctor Who baddie is currently sitting atop the Frank Gehry-designed Stata Center, presumably in response to an oversized TARDIS that appeared on campus in 2010.

[nerdapproved.]