Hope everyone has a great time tonight and a fantastic year ahead.

See you in 2010!

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The year started with Terminator promo and press tours. The show returned with the last nine episodes in the Friday slot in mid-February.

Later that month, Garret was spotted filming Winter’s Bone in Missouri. The film will premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in late January. If anyone plans on going, the Sundance screening schedule is here.

The Last House on the Left opened on March 13. The reviews ranged from excellent to free branding campaign and the film made it to several lists of best horrors of the year. In October, it won a Reaper Award for Best Theatrical Release in 2009.

Toward the end of the month, Garret played his fifth character on T:SCC, the Skynet virus from the future. Previous four were George Laszlo, Cromartie, the Beastwizard and John Henry.

In late March, the first pictures from Burning Bright appeared online. Burning Bright was later renamed to Ravenous and it still awaits theatrical release. In November, it was screened at the AFM. The first reviews were pretty positive.

In early April, Water Pills had its U.S. premiere at the Florida Film Festival. Jasmine Jessica Anthony walked away with a grand jury award for best performance.

Also in April, two series finales aired two days apart. Garret snuffed the TV crew and gave Damian Lewis his final headache in Life on April 8. Life season two was released on DVD on August 25.

The Terminator finale aired on April 10. Despite cancellation, the show made it to #8 on the list of  the Top 10 Most Pirated Shows in 2009. Last year, it was the only new show among the top 10, at #4.

In the meantime, Garret joined Delroy Lindo and Roslyn Ruff in Things of Dry Hours, a play by Naomi Wallace about communists in 1930s Alabama. Rehearsals started on April 21.

The first trailer for The Road hit the web on May 15.

On May 18, Fox announced that they would not be picking up Terminator for a third season. Even though there has been talk of a possible TV/DVD movie, Terminator rights are currently up for grabs and in limbo until February 2010.

On May 20, Garret appeared in the season finale of Criminal Minds.

Two days later, Things of Dry Hours went into previews at the New York Theatre Workshop. The show premiered on June 8 and ran through June 28. Critics liked the cast, but were divided on the writing.

At some point over the spring/summer, Garret was cast in Madeleine Stowe’s Unbound Captives, an independent western epic with Hugh Jackman, Rachel Weisz and Robert Pattinson. If they get financing in time, the film will go into production in March (at the earliest).

In late July and early August, Garret filmed two TV guest appearances,  on CSI and Lie to Me, and a short film, One Night Only.

The Last House on the Left was released on DVD in mid-August.

Later that month, Garret was spotted filming the season three finale of Burn Notice. The episode will air in March 2010.

The trailer for One Night Only was released on September 2.

On September 3, The Road had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival. Ten days later, it was screened in Toronto.

Terminator: The Complete Season Two was released on DVD on September 22.

On September 24, the CSI season 10 premiere aired. “Family Affair” is one of the five hours of television nominated for an ASC (American Society of Cinematographers) Award this year.

Speaking of CSI, in a fine display of Terminator fanboyism, the last episode before the break, Better off Dead, had a bunch of people stealing Cromartie’s music and killing each other. Also, a killer described as a Terminator.

On October 13, Oliver Sherman, an independent drama with Molly Parker and Donal Logue, went into production in North Bay. The film will most likely premiere at the Toronto Film Festival in September 2010, but Canadians might get an early screening in the spring.

On October 21st, Garret appeared on Lie to Me.

And two days later, on Law & Order: SVU.

The Road finally saw its U.S. premiere at AFI fest in early November. On Thanksgiving, it got a limited release. Even though the film has been vastly overlooked in the early awards season, the reviews were mostly positive and it scored a few acting nods (Viggo Mortensen, Robert Duvall, Kodi Smit-McPhee) from several critics’ societies (Broadcast Film Critics, Utah Film Critics, St. Louis Film Critics).

On November 13, Garret appeared on White Collar.

And the next day, One Night Only had its premiere in New York.

In November, Garret was cast in two new projects. The comedy pilot Keep Hope Alive, with Martha Plimpton, Cloris Leachman and Lucas Neff, was filmed earlier this month. If it gets picked up, it will be aired in the 2010/11 season.

The other project, John Sayles’ film Baryo, starts shooting in February in the Philippines. The crew is already there, building the set and preparing for the shoot. You can follow the updates on the new production blog, at johnsaylesbaryo.blogspot.com.

And that about wraps it up. If 2010 is even half as eventful, it will be another excellent year.

The Last House on the Left was released on DVD and Blu-ray a couple of weeks ago. The region 2 DVD will be out on October 19.

The Road will premiere in Venice on September 3. That’s tomorrow. It will then be shown 10 days later (Sept. 13 & 14) in the Special Presentations program at the Toronto Film Festival. The listing is here. There are also rumours that it will be screened at Telluride (Sept. 4-7) so if you are in the Colorado area, keep an eye on the festival’s official site. The film opens wide on October 16.

Oliver Sherman starts filming in about a month. A couple of weeks ago, they were still casting a whole bunch of characters.  The casting call is here.

On the TV front…

Life: Season Two was released on DVD on August 25. You can find a review and the DVD details here.

The Burn Notice season three finale will air some time in March. Ausiello at Entertainment Weekly describes Garret’s character  as a “scary-smart new client of Michael’s (Jeffrey Donovan) — and perhaps the first person to outsmart him.”

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles might still return as a movie. Here is what Thomas Dekker told the TV Addict the other day: “They’ve spoken about doing a TV movie. Well, not a TV movie, but kind of like a direct-to-DVD movie. Obviously it’s difficult because the show is based on a movie and they just had one come out, so it’s kind of hard to make a movie with our show because everyone has kind of forgotten about us. But they’re hoping, at least when I spoke to [Producer] James Middleton that’s where they are with it.”

The teaser for the CSI season premiere is online, as well as the press release and some pics from the episode (of Jorja Fox mostly). The show returns on September 24.

More updates as they come.

In related news, Josh Friedman is back among the living in the blogosphere and has a lengthy post up about the days leading up to the cancellation. You can check it out HERE.

The fan campaign isn’t over either. Earlier today, someone posted this on Warner Bros’ official Twitter page: “I hear ur proclamations of TSCC love – so I gotta know, when did u first fall under TSCC’s spell?” Bottom line, WB may not be as disinclined to shop the show around as they were only weeks ago, so if you have a Twitter account, consider leaving them a quick message. The show is also now being streamed on the WB site. You can revisit the first five episodes of season one HERE.

There’s also a bunch of bigger season one screencaps (season two coming this week) on the site:

1×04 Heavy Metal, page one
1×04 Heavy Metal, page two
1×05 Queen’s Gambit
1×08 Vick’s Chip, page one
1×08 Vick’s Chip, page two
1×09 What He Beheld

And there’s also some Life news:

Season two will be available on DVD a bit earlier than Terminator, on August 25. If you are not planning on getting it and either live in the U.S. or know how to use proxies, you can still check out both episodes with Garret on Hulu at these links: 2×12 Trapdoor, 2×21 One.

Since the show hasn’t had the best ratings this season and may not return in the fall, the fans are organizing a letter writing campaign to NBC. For info on where to send letters, visit the Save Life thread at the official board.

“I Want to Speak to Manny”

“Why Is It Here?”

“Born to Run” airs on Friday, April 10 at 8pm on Fox.

Also, Zap2It has an interesting interview with the show’s creator Rand Ravich and star Damian Lewis.

Episode 2×21, “One,” airs tonight at 9 on NBC.

SpoilerTV posted some promotional pics earlier today and most of them have Roman Nevikov (looking a lot like Garret and not some random guy posing behind bars and laughing evilly about it in Crews’ face) in them.

For those who have followed the series so far or just tuned in in the last couple of episodes: the pictures reveal a major plot point so don’t look at them unless you want to be spoiled.

To see the pics, hit this link: Life 2×21 One.

The season finale, which might also double as the series finale if the Nielsen dinosaur has the last say, airs on Wednesday, April 8, at 9PM/8PMc on NBC.

Someone recently updated Garret’s IMDb page to add an uncredited third appearance in episode #22 of Life.

If you were planning on tuning in: there is no episode #22.

NBC cut the order to 21 episodes earlier this year, so the season ends on Wednesday, April 8, with episode #21, “One.”

Here is the synopsis:

In the season two finale episode Crews (Damian Lewis) must locate his partner Reese (Sarah Shahi) who has gone missing while on loan to the F.B.I. Her disappearance is directly tied to Crews and he will do whatever it takes to get her back. In the events that transpire, shocking details about the conspiracy against Crews will be revealed. Gabrielle Reese, Donal Logue, Brent Sexton and Adam Arkin also star.

I haven’t been able to find any info on guest appearances for the episode, but the casting call at SpoilerTV mentions a Russian mob boss and, as far as I can remember, there has only been one important one on the show so far.

NBC’s site isn’t particularly helpful, but we’ll probably know more after tomorrow’s episode, when the teaser shows up. If you wanna refresh your memory, here  are two old clips from the show’s highlights section at NBC.com (I have no idea what is in the second one since it’s only available in the U.S. so if it doesn’t belong here, please let me know):

S01E05:

S02E12:

While I’m at it, here is the preview for tomorrow’s episode (2×20, “Initiative 38″), which airs at 9PM/8PMc on NBC:

The second one is just Garret and AICN’s Capone. It includes some Sarah Connor spoilers and finally the info about the character he plays in Winter’s Bone. Snippets below:

In many ways, the character you’re playing in LAST HOUSE, especially in the way he was played by David Hess in the original, marked a turning point in the way evil was depicted on screen, and the evil that men do. Where is the starting point for you in bringing a character like that to life?

Garret Dillahunt: I guess it’s different for every part. Some you kind of know. Sometimes you’re like, “I’ve met this guy.” I’ve certainly never met this guy. I did read a lot. I got one of the Amazon Kindle things, which I thought I would hate, but I really love, and I packed it with 15 or 20 books I thought would be of interest, about serial killers and spree killers. There’s one in particular, and I can’t remember which one it was now, that kind of detailed a whole bunch of different killers. I think I was looking for little clue to explain why he was the way he was. I do think he’s a spree killer, not a serial killer–I learned the difference in that. Do you remember Andrew Cunanan?

The guy who died in Florida, sure.

GD: Yeah, the guy who killer Versace. I never would have thought that I’d find a lot for my guy in him, but I did, because there was this one story, really horrible. I guess I didn’t really know about all of the other people he’d killed on his way to Florida. There was one in particular that was a home invasion–I think he needed a new car–and he must have surprised someone at home. It was an older gentleman who had a military background, and they said he killed him so viciously and it was odd because that kind of cruelty is usually reserved for people that know the victim.

Did having worked with her before help at all in staging that horrific rape scene?

GD: It was helpful. But it was both, I think. Because you don’t want to do that to your friend, and I considered her my friend. I kept saying how nervous I was and that I was more nervous that she was, and she misunderstood my nerves. It wasn’t that I was nervous that I could do it; I was nervous that she wouldn’t like me after I did. Because I like her. She was 15 when we worked together the first time, and she was 19 or 20 now, and I like her and feel protective of her. So in the end, I think that it was helpful. That scene has to be about her. She’s going to go to a real dark place all day long, and I’m going to grind her in the dirt. There’s no room for joking around between takes. Let’s just be focused and not to this 100 times. We’ll do a good job, and between takes, I’ll help her up and put a blanket around her and make sure she’s safe. I think we made it the least weird we could. She was real nice to me and grateful.

That’s especially good to hear because, if you believe the stories, the actress to played the role in the original essentially lost her mind because of those scenes.

GD: Yeah, there are different philosophies about how to act. I personally don’t think it should be psychologically damaging. There’s no money in that. [laughs] That’s not acting. I prefer a little more craft than that. I don’t see why I would be needed if I actually had to become that thing.

I’m also a fan of “The Sarah Connor Chronicles,” so I have to ask about John Henry. There’s so much being made about how the shift to Fridays is a bad sign for the show’s future and the rating, and they’re kind of missing the point that the show has never been better, especially those scenes with you and Shirley Manson.

GD: I guess I like to be different with each character if I can, and I’ve been fortunate to have some options that way. Krug was certainly a departure from the last thing I did. And since I got to do something like four characters to play on “Terminator“–John Henry, Cromartie, George Laszlo, and that Beastwizard character–I just wanted John Henry to be very different. I thought, he’s going to be so much smarter because he’d plugged into this supercomputer, and he seems interested and curious in humans, so it seemed like a great opportunity to explore human emotions and learning and what I don’t know at times. And I like Shirley a lot, really fun, very well read and articulate, and everything just sounds cool with a Scottish accent.

So where does John Henry go from here. Does he finally get to leave that room?

GD: He does get to leave the room. I wish it had been a little earlier, but I will eventually get to leave that room. There are big fingers crossed for next season where I’ll be going, but I don’t know; we’ll see where that goes.

Is there still more learning to do for that character?

GD: I don’t even know what episode we’re on. I play with lots of toys. Later I get in a fight, a computer fight, that is quite traumatic for him. He loses his innocence a little bit. I’m sorry I’m being so vague.

Speaking of being in a separate story from the main plot, you and Tommy Lee Jones had your own little movie going on in NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN.

GD: Javier [Bardem] was talking about how wild it was that we won this ensemble award at the SAG Awards and we barely got to work with each other. Each of us had our own movie. That’s not really what ensemble means but it was interesting. I never crossed paths with Javier or Josh [Brolin].

Being a part of that film had to mean so much to you…

GD: Yeah, I was just happy to be a part of it. I’m a big fan of Cormac McCarthy’s work, and I was determined to be in every Cormac McCarthy movie there every was. So far two! It was actually “Deadwood” that made me just want to do stuff I was proud of.

And with “Deadwood,” they loved you so much, they couldn’t let you go even after your character died.

GD: I know. Thank God, right? That’s my niche. I’m dying for a niche.

Who do you play in THE ROAD?

GD: Well, it’s weird because it’s really about The Boy and The Man. No one has names in the book. Viggo Mortensen plays The Man, and Kodi Smit plays The Boy. I play The Gang Member. We all had two days if we’re not Kodi or Viggo, and it’s a great group of people who are willing to do that. Robert Duvall is in it, Charlize Theron, Guy Pearce is great. Molly Parker from “Deadwood” is in it as well. It was just cool to be a part of. I’m a big fan of THE PROPOSITION.

I sat down with Viggo in October right after they’d announced that THE ROAD was not coming out at the end of last year as originally intended. He just really wanted to see it because he hadn’t at that time.

GD: I think it deserves awards. I’m sure he’s seen it by now. I saw a screening here about three weeks ago, here in L.A. I think it’s pretty beautiful. If you’re a fan of the book, you’ll be a fan of the movie.

Aside from THE ROAD, what is next for you?

GD: I’m filming a movie right now called WINTER’S BONE, based on a book of the same name by this guy named Daniel Woodrell. He wrote the book RIDE WITH THE DEVIL was based on. Do you remember that?

The Ang Lee film?

GD: I think that film is kind of underrated. I like that. Same author, but it’s a little more contemporary. It’s about hillbillies cooking meth in the Ozarks. I’m a sheriff in that one, back to playing good guys again. I’m not always bad guys.

Well, you did play Jesus.

GD: Can’t get much better than that. You played him, you can play as many bad guys as you want.

Why do you think guys like ["Deadwood" creator] David Milch or ["Terminator" creator] Josh Friedman or Wes Craven see you as the bad guy? Are you giving off some vibe?

GD: I don’t know. I just like interesting role and good stories. And often, the villain is the most interesting role. Maybe they understand that no one is just good and just bad. It’s always surprising.

You tend to alter your facial hair for each part, does that inform you into the character’s state of mind in any way?

GD: [laughs] I guess I do. I don’t know if it specifically it does, but it is like any other part of your costume. I need the right shoes. I remember reading about Michael Caine. If his feet aren’t in a short, he’s going to wear his old comfy tennis shoes, even if he’s wearing a suit or something. That’s the kind of thing that throws me off completely. I need my heavy boots on for Krug. [Ain't It Cool News]

Can we just talk about Cromartie’s death scene for a moment. How much fun was it to shoot knowing that… you’d be back.
Garret Dillahunt: It was fun. I kind of wished we had time for effects to go even further, you know, pound me into mush. But the shotgun was pretty potent. You should have been in that room. She [Summer Glau] just shot it and the air in the room would ruffle your clothes from the gun. I thought it looked really cool and the green screen stuff they did with my face was perfect.

Is it an entirely different show for you now that you’re playing John Henry? Are you enjoying yourself?
It’s fun to have real conversations. John Henry doesn’t have an agenda, other than curiosity at this point. He’s just trying to absorb as much information as he can. I get to be sort of infantile, childlike and genuine. But I know in upcoming episodes I’m going to be out of the room, loose in the world, and somewhat of a super-powered baby.

That was my next question, how does that work?
Well, I’m still the Cromartie body. Still capable of all the same things that Cromartie was capable of doing, just with a bigger brain. I don’t have a task yet so it’s kind of scary, sort of being a smarter Cromartie. Which I think is going to make him dangerous because he doesn’t even know his own powers yet. But I don’t really know what’s going to happen. I do know that I make a friend, a very dangerous friend… maybe it’s a girlfriend, wouldn’t that be great! [Laughs] And I do get into a fight. A big fight happens and it’s a real learning experience where I’ll experience fear and emotion for the first time.

So if one were to assume that John Henry is the birth of Skynet, would it be fair to assume that how humans treat you in the next half of a season might…
Determine my, our [Skynet’s] whole approach to humanity. Maybe.

Outside of TERMINATOR of course, what do you like to watch?
I like MMA stuff, I know that sounds really lame but I like mixed martial arts. In terms of scripted TV I still watch some ER because I have a buddy who runs the show and just directed his first episode, I like LOST, I watch a lot of TV.

Fans loved you on LIFE.
I like LIFE, and I think it’s getting better and better. I have a lot of fun with that Russian guy. For some reason having an accent gives you a license to do whatever you want. [The TV Addict]