{"id":9015,"date":"2013-09-06T01:35:50","date_gmt":"2013-09-06T05:35:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/?p=9015"},"modified":"2013-09-06T01:35:50","modified_gmt":"2013-09-06T05:35:50","slug":"transmissions-syfy-announces-cast-additions-for-season-2-of-defiance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/?p=9015","title":{"rendered":"Transmissions: Syfy Announces Cast Additions for Season 2 of Defiance"},"content":{"rendered":"

Syfy announces additional casting for Season 2 of its highly\"Defiance1\"<\/a>-rated and groundbreaking drama series, Defiance.\u00a0 William Atherton signs on to portray high-ranking Earth Republic official Viceroy Mercado and Anna Hopkins has inked the role of Earth Republic soldier and documentarian Jessica \u201cBerlin\u201d Rai.\u00a0 Slated for a June 2014 launch, production is currently underway in Toronto, ON for the 13-episode second season of the ambitious series, which delivered an average of 1.5 million viewers 18-49 and 3.2 million total viewers in its first season, based on Live +7 data. Defiance is produced by Universal Cable Productions.<\/p>\n

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Atherton steps into the supporting role of the jaded, Earth Republic official Viceroy Mercado, Major Pottinger\u2019s (James Murray) commanding officer.\u00a0 Mercado is ruthless, quick tongued and sarcastic, fond of peppering his sentences with obscure old Earth cultural references and mocking younger subordinates for being too young to understand. He sees Pottinger for the manipulative person he is, but grudgingly admits the man gets results.\u00a0 Mercado also has a dark secret that would shock his colleagues and the townspeople of Defiance.<\/p>\n

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Atherton attended the Drama School at Carnegie Tech and began his career on the New York stage working with many of the country\u2019s leading playwrights including David Rabe, John Guare and Arthur Miller.\u00a0 He got his big break playing hapless fugitive Clovis Poplin in Steven Spielberg\u2019s The Sugarland Express.\u00a0 After this, he garnered major roles in dark drams such as The Day of the Locust and Looking for Mr. Goodbar, as well as the big-budget disaster film The Hindenburg.\u00a0 He also starred as cowboy Jim Lloyd in the groundbreaking 1978 miniseries Centennial.\u00a0 Atherton\u2019s other film credits include Ghostbusters, Real Genius, Die Hard, No Mercy, The Pelican Brief and The Last Samurai.\u00a0 He has also made guest appearances on numerous TV shows including Desperate Housewives, Law & Order, Boston Legal and Monk.<\/p>\n

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Hopkins joins the cast as the sexy, tough and fearless Jessica \u201cBerlin\u201d Rai, an Earth Republic soldier and documentarian who makes propaganda films that shine a positive light on the Earth Republic occupation of Defiance.\u00a0 Berlin believes in her films\u2019 messages having grown up during the lawless and volatile years of the Pale Wars, and now seeing the government as a means to protect and unite by any means necessary.\u00a0 Sexy and confident, Berlin becomes the center of a passionate love triangle.\u00a0 Hopkins is a Montreal native and holds a Communications degree from Concordia University.\u00a0 She jumped into the acting scene in 2005 with a role in the film Barney\u2019s Version alongside Dustin Hoffman and Paul Giamatti.\u00a0 She has also had appearances in television\u2019s Nikita, Law & Order and Stephen King\u2019s Dead Zone, as well as in the TV movies Human Trafficking, Too Young to Marry and Circle of Friends.<\/p>\n

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Atherton and Hopkins join the previously announced James Murray as new cast additions to season two of the series.\u00a0 Murray will portray the integral role of Pottinger, the new mayor of Defiance.<\/p>\n

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Grant Bowler will return as Nolan, along with Julie Benz as Amanda Rosewater, Stephanie Leonidas as Irisa Nolan, Tony Curran as Datak Tarr, Jaime Murray as Stahma Tarr, Graham Greene as Rafe McCawley and Jesse Rath as Alak Tarr.\u00a0 The cast also features Dewshane Williams as Tommy, Trenna Keating as Doc Yewll, Justin Rain as Quentin McCawley and Nicole Munoz as Christie McCawley.<\/p>\n

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As the story of Defiance resumes, the lives of the townspeople are in drastic turmoil.\u00a0 The Earth Republic has assumed control of the town, with far-reaching consequences including a new mayor.\u00a0 Nolan traverses the badlands to find a lost Irisa, Amanda has an unexpected new role in the town as she searches for Kenya and the Tarr family desperately tries to keep control of their criminal empire in the midst of dramatic changes.<\/p>\n

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Kevin Murphy (Desperate Housewives, Caprica) resumes his role as executive producer and showrunner. Smallville\u2019s Darren Swimmer and Todd Slavkin return as executive producers for season two and Michael Taylor serves as consulting producer.\u00a0 Michael Nankin (co-executive producer) is set to direct the season two opener.<\/p>\n

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Defiance is an unprecedented partnership between Syfy and Trion Worlds and the first-ever convergence of television and online gaming, featuring an interconnected world and storylines that co-exist on both platforms.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Syfy announces additional casting for Season 2 of its highly-rated and groundbreaking drama series, Defiance.\u00a0 William Atherton signs on to portray high-ranking Earth Republic official Viceroy Mercado and Anna Hopkins has inked the role of Earth Republic soldier and documentarian … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[857,3026,2698,1483,1484,2699,3027,2721,3028,91,39,1659,1486,66],"class_list":["post-9015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-transmissions","tag-aliens","tag-darren-swimmer","tag-defiance","tag-grant-bowler","tag-julie-benz","tag-kevin-murphy","tag-michael-nankin","tag-nolan","tag-pale-wars","tag-science-fiction","tag-syfy","tag-trion","tag-trion-worlds","tag-video-game"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9015","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9015"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9015\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9017,"href":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9015\/revisions\/9017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9015"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9015"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geekstronomy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9015"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}