Sci-Fi Bulletin: Exploring the Universes of SF, Fantasy, Horror and Spy-fi!

As well as signing up for duties in a galaxy far, far away, J.J. Abrams has committed to two new shows for pilot season.

An untitled project has now been greenlit at Fox from Abrams and his Fringe colleague J.H. Wyman, set in a near future where Los Angeles cops are partnered with androids. The “action-packed buddy cop show” has had a pilot production commitment since September.

NBC has signed off on Believe, described as being “about the unlikely relationship between a girl in possession of a great gift/powers — which will come into their own in seven years — and the man who is sprung from prison to protect her from those trying to hunt her down.” The pilot was written by Alfonso Cuarón and Mark Friedman; they will co-produce with Abrams and Bryan Burk.

These aren’t the only genre-related pilots under starters’ orders: the CW has ordered The Hundred, set 97 years after a nuclear war. A hundred juvenile delinquents are sent back to Earth to investigate whether it’s habitable. The CW are also behind Oxygen, about a human society where aliens are kept in prison, as well as a second pilot for The Selection, and a spin-off from The Vampire Diaries.

ABC has Joss Whedon’s SHIELD series, which has now entered production; and The Returned, about deceased people turning up on their loved ones’ doorsteps. CBS has its adaptation of Stephen King’s Under the Dome.  NBC also have Bloodline, about a girl caught in the middle of a mystical ancient fight and Carlton’s Cuse’s supernatural Western The Sixth Gun, based on the Oni Press comic. Fox is also working on Delirium, about a world where love is deemed illegal, based on the novels by Lauren Oliver; and last, but not least, the Kurtzman/Orci revamp of Sleepy Hollow (which is sounding more and more like Haven the more we hear about it!)