Teen Wolf News 011316
Finale Filming
This week found most of the Teen Wolf cast and crew back at work in their Northridge, California studio.
Despite the fact they officially wrapped production on December 18, there is still work to do on the Season 5 finale. Key scenes, like the final showdown with The Beast of Gevaudan are being filmed this week.
Tuesday found everyone kitted out in their full transformation make-up for Episode 20 scenes.
After they wrap these final scenes, most folks will have a few weeks off before Season 6 begins filming. While we don’t yet have firm dates for S6, we’re told it could be as early as February.
Teen Wolf a Top Streaming Show
Teen Wolf News has joined the Fox Broadcast Network and NBC Universal in dumping the traditional overnight ratings. As soon as they are available, we’ll bring you the Teen Wolf +7 DVR ratings which are a better indication of how many people actually watch the show on television in a given week.
DVR viewing and internet streaming have altered the television landscape to such a large extent that even those extended viewing numbers don’t tell the whole story.
A company called Tru Optik Data is trying to bridge the gap between the traditional ratings and the reality of modern viewing. After modeling its data against old-timey TV ratings and other information, Tru Optik has published a list of ten TV shows that didn’t do very well in traditional ratings but are expected to kill it online in 2016. Teen Wolf, as you might expect, is among them.
- 12 Monkeys - SyFy
- Archer - FX
- Arrow - CW
- Doctor Who - BBC America
- New Girl – FOX
- Pretty Little Liars - ABC Family
- Suits - USA
- Supernatural - CW
- Teen Wolf - MTV
- The Last Ship - TNT
Tru Optik has dubbed these shows “OTT hits.” OTT means “Over the Top” which is their term for the various streaming options available to audiences now.
“The OTT viewing experience is different than the traditional TV-watching experience,” according to Tru Optik Chief Strategist David Wiesenfeld. “Consumers actively choose what they want to watch and when. This leads to a different set of choices than for linear TV, which is a more passive activity.”
He says the audience watching via streaming is of a different composition too. “The OTT viewer tends to be a younger, more progressive media consumer,” said Wiesenfeld. “They are the cord-cutters, cord-shavers, and cord-nevers. Millennial and Generation Z viewers are hard to reach on linear TV because they watch TV on lots of different screens and expect entertainment to be available on-demand.”
Tru Optik has come up with a way for advertisers and networks to better gauge and monetize these OTT viewers but it is a small company in its infancy. Despite the one billion consumers of streaming services worldwide, don’t expect the big players in the television business to embrace this system anytime soon.
Crystal Reed Returns to Teen Wolf
Actor Crystal Reed is returning to Teen Wolf almost two years after leaving the hit MTV show when her character, Allison Argent, died tragically at the hands of Oni demon warriors.
Teen Wolf Crystal Reed Returns Season 5 Behind the Scenes
Reed will portray an Argent ancestor called Marie-Jeanne Valet. According to Teen Wolf Wikia, Valet was a young girl who tangled with a werewolf and won in 18th century France.
- Marie-Jeanne Valet and her younger sister were reportedly attacked by the beast while crossing a creek near the River Desges. Valet successfully defended herself and her sister with a bayonet mounted at the end of a staff, wounding the Beast, which threw itself into the river and thrashed about madly before escaping.
- The Royal Gunbearer praised Valet and compared her to French heroine Joan of Arc.
Reed will take up her longbow in the Teen Wolf Season 5 Episode The Maid of Gévaudan.
Keeping the Crystal Reed Secret
I agreed without really thinking about it. Teen Wolf Executive Producer Jeff Davis told me there would be a major returning actor story this season but asked me not to say anything about it so I said, “No problem.”
That was back in July during ComicCon.
When news started filtering through my various sources that Crystal Reed was back on set last month, I realized I had agreed to stay mum on the biggest story of this season.
I kept searching the various gossip sites and social media to see if maybe someone would leak the news early (thereby justifying me publishing something about it) but there was nothing. Apparently I wasn’t the only one holding back with the secret.
I admit I cheated a little bit. We did publish the fact that they were doing a period piece set during the Beast of Gevaudan’s original reign of terror in the 18th century but I bit my tongue and didn’t add that Reed would be at the heart of it.
I actually like how they finally released the information. The BuzzFeed article was great and the pictures, all the fake snow and Reed looking like a badass Belle from Beauty and the Beast, were perfect.
The effect it had on the fandom was like a bomb going off with worldwide trending on twitter and actual tears from some fans. It wouldn’t have been the same if it had leaked earlier even though I was about to bust to tell the story.
Co-Dominance
Next week, in Co-Dominance, Teen Wolf will venture east. Kira and her mom have arrived in New Mexico and just met the Native American skinwalkers.
The trip is part of helping Kira deal with her dark side although the role the native lore will play in that process has yet to be seen.
The production worked with a Navajo consultant to help with developing the Teen Wolf version of the well-known shapeshifter myths.
Teen Wolf airs on Tuesday, January 19 at 9PM on MTV.