NOTICE: The following report does contain spoilers on things happening in the new season of Andromeda

The ComicCon 2001 Andromeda panel happened Friday afternoon following a marathon Kevin Smith panel to a packed house in the shows biggest room.  Andromeda didn't keep the room full, but it was  a decent sized crowd for the last major panel of the day.  Present were Exec Producer Robert H. Wolfe, Writers Ethlie Ann Vare, Zack Stentz, Ashley Edward Miller, production designer Richard B. Lewis and Writer's Assistant Deric A. Hughes plus some Tribune representatives.  They were introduced by Tribune Entertainment executive Henry Urick who also informed the crowd that after the Andromeda panel, we'd see some footage from Tribune's new series Mutant X and hear from it's head writer Howard Chaykin.

To kick off the Andromeda panel, they screened a Tribune promo reel touting the show's strong debut and success in first run syndication that was put together for the NATPE convention.  After the panelists were introduced, Wolfe thanked the crowd for coming out and noted that they'd done 32 episodes already.   "You make these shows for the television fan in your own heart and you hope someone else out there will watch them.  It's nice when we get to come out for air to actually look around and say Hey! people actually dig the show!"

He described the season finale as "everyone on the show is potentially dead or dying and the ship has a huge freaking hole blown thorugh it and the Magog have dragged people off and it looks pretty grim and then the next episode comes along and things get worse, basically.

They're really excited about the new season, saying that "in any Enterprise there is a learning curve."  They'd never done a starship based show in Vancouver and that there was a big improvement from the first episode to the last episode, he actually wished that the viewer had seen less of the learning curve onscreen.  They've hired Richard B. Lewis as a new production designer to enhance the sets to make them look amazing in year two.  They also have a new costume designer and that they have some really terrific stories and some terrific guest stars.

Guest Stars - William B. Davis in Pitiless as the Sun

James Marsters (loud cheer from Spike fans) as Charlemagne Bolivar - Character tells Tyr that his pride (Kodiak) took the physical perfection too far.  His pride developed table manners and made themselves into good trophy husbands and wives.

Bruce Harwood of the Lone Gunmen
Roger Cross from First Wave - All Too Human - Antagonist to Andromeda.  He's the person getting in the way of what Andromeda wants to get accomplished.

Ethlie Ann Vare -  Notes that the writing staff hasn't changed and it is making wonderful continuity.  They live, breath and, unfortunately, dream Andromeda so the fact that they all have stayed together is good for the show, and for putting her son through college.  The last show she was on was Earth: Final Conflict, which had a big lack of continuity in the writing staff.   As she continued to talk about EFC, Robert started saying "Stay on Target" to get her back to Andromeda.  Having generally been known for channeling Becka Valentine, only one of the two stories she did so far was about Becka while the other is about Dylan, which was an interesting experience.  Zach commented that the Dylan episode was a "beautiful love story" and Ethlie commented that Kevin Sorbo really liked it.

Zach and Ashley commented that it was strange to be on that side of the panel, since they are the fanboy representatives on the writing staff.

All Too Human - A Rommie episode where she goes to a planet and kicks butt and has adventures like Caine in Kung Fu.

Una Salus Victus - The Male Genetalia Swinging Contest between Dylan and Tyr.  They bust out their force lances and that rediculously large gun and figure out which one is bigger.  It's all about love and blowing things up.  They are so well-endowed it takes 42 minutes for them to resolve it and they somehow manage to slip in a Beka B-Story in it.

They've been able to continue some of the stuff that was set up in the first season.

They've had a mini-baby boom.  Had both Sam Sorbo and Gordon Wolvett's wife in episodes in full bloom.

Last Call at the Broken Hammer - Heroes arrive at a deserty blown out planet with a waste away bar called the Broken Hammer.  Doesn't bode well for the owner of the bar, or the patrons of the bar or the bar itself.

The Widening Gyre - More bad things happen to good people. Title from a Yeats poem

On pretentious titles - Episode when Dylan loses his touch with basketball called "The Center Cannot Hold".

Exit Strategies - Matt & Joe - Shows the ramifications of the season opener where the crew are contemplating their exit strategies.  Little bit like the TNG episode "Family" except it doesn't have two old guys wrestling in a vineyard and has lots more explosions.

A Heart for Falsehood Framed - Beka episode written by Ethlie. There will be sex.  "Touched by a Beka" Ethlie comment - "They went through high school playing role playing games.  I dated."  After a round of applause from the audience Ashley commented "But all the guys she dated are pumping gas now."

Pitiless as the Sun - Trance Vs. the Cigarrette Smoking man.  Don't put your money on Cancer man.  The little purple girl versus the incarnation of all evil in the universe as we know it.

LCatBH - Cool new prosthetics.

All Too Human - Rommie kicking buttocks and taking names on a mission as a spy on a planet where she's trying to get some information and foolishly people decide they don't want her to have it.  Features a really cool space battle between Andromeda and a local super weapon.

Into the Labrynth - Charelmange Bouliver - Spike Without a Shirt (Whooo! from the audience).  He peels kiwis for Lisa Ryder.  She admires his strategy. That's actually the B story.  The A story features a hot young actress for the guys to look at.

Unos Salas Victus - Translates to Last Hope for the Damned - Flashback to Dylan's time of the Special Operations Services.  Opening Quote - Argosy Special Operations Services Requisition Form - Requested 1,000 kilometers of fulcrum(?) cable, 1 Mark 5 ECM unit, one low yield nuclear weapon.  Purpose: Suprise party for foreign dignitary.

The Prince - About a young prince who gets two co-regents after his fatther dies - Dylan and Tyr.

Home Fires - Sweet and lovely story which brings back Gaheris Rhade and Sara Riley (Sam Sorbo) - They discover a planet who thinks the Commonwealth is still going.  They have an Argosy and ships and people in uniforms and they aren't killer robots.

Richard Lewis - He lives and dies by what the writers give him.  His goal was to take a successful show and jack it up a notch or two.  There was some rebuilding after the destruction seen in the season finale.  Opportunity to play with different worlds and locations every week.  Great collabrative experience.  Responsbile for the artistic continuity of a production.  Can design what worlds are.  Gives every place they go a signature to make them look different.    Zack commented that he drew on a small comment in their script for All Too Human and created a water motif to the planet that they really liked.

They then showed a promo reel that Deric Hughes and his roommate put together of clips from season two on their own intitiative.  It was done on their Mac at home using Final Cut Pro.  The panelists all ran around to the front of the stage so they could see it.  It showed clips of Tyr and Harper being prepared by Magog, Dylan and Co. fighting and being chased outdoors in the snow, Tyr saying "You should never trust any Neitchian... except me." which cut to scenes of Dylan and Gaheris Rhade fighting, Try and Charlemagn holding their arms against each others (cheer from the audience for James), Beka kicking butt, Beka lounging and talking to a shirtless Charlemagne Bolivar (really big cheer from audience), Rommie kicking butt, responding to Harwood "A.I.'s don't have any what?  Emotions?  You'd be surprised." Some shots of Tyr in action with voiceover of  Dylan - "Everything on this ship belongs to me." then we see Tyr (shouting) "I don't belong to you!".  Shots of Trance laughing and a shot of some galaxies being held in Trance's hand as we continue to hear her laughter, ending with a slo-mo shot of Rommie looking at the camera with he hair being blown back.

Question & Answer session - They had Andromeda posters for those who asked the questions and they would have trivia questions to get a signed Kevin Sorbo picture.

Questioneer really liked Mathematics of Tears and the opera theme to it.  Wolfe commented that he thought that episode was the first where all the cylinders clicked for the episode.

Tribune Reel - put together by Tribune team in Atlanta.  Fed Exed it to them on Thursday night with 8 am delivery.  No tape.  Where is it?  Houston.  When will it get to L.A.? Sunday.  The plane stopped in Houston and couldn't take off.  Henry Urick arranged to have the promo sent via satellite after a Tribune news feed, which the local Tribune station taped for them, sending a courier over to the con getting it to them fifteen minutes before the panel.  Urick also had a couple of the prototype dolls from the Blue Box toys Andromeda figures (Rev Bem and Dylan Hunt).  Trading cards from Inkworks in November.

Trance - We will learn more about Trance than we have learned before.  Spends a lot of the episode talking to William B. Davis.  Tells him a lot.  How much of it is true...  Had written a B story where Trance had a love interested which ended up being taken out of the story.  We will learn the ultimate truth about Trance and they do know what it is and aren't making it up as they go along.  Into the Labyrinth will also deal with Trance, her tatoo, and the Librarians.

During the Q&A session, Henry Urick noted that they actually had enough posters for everyone.  They also had promo sheets to hand out as well.

How many seasons ? Asks the tribune execs if he can say that there will be a season three.  Yes!  Indications are good.  Urick said yes to a full five years.

Other episodes from Science fiction writers.  Looking forward to a Spider Robinson script and Walter Jon Williams would like to do another one.  David Brin is also interested.  Tough problem to get freelancers to do a show for them with the tight production schedule.  Freelance ones so far this season are by faeature writers, John Perry and Eric Olsen.

At the end, they screened the Tribune reel, which had lots of quick cuts and ends with a sun exploding that was seen in the season finale...

In this report I focused mostly on the news and information given out.  there were lots of jokes and comments and some good answers to questions that were very informative but I didn't have time to transcribe it all yet.  So check back again to see the additional material to be added soon.