The WB’s Strip Tease: ‘Baby Blues’

Having trouble surviving another episode of “Survivor”? Tired of viewing the bickering on “Big Brother”? Does “Just Shoot Me” sound less like a sitcom and more like your mood as the summer reruns roll on prime time? Well, original relief lands Friday in the form of the animated series “Baby Blues” on the WB. Based on the popular comic strip, the 8 p.m. premiere features a vocal cameo by Drew Carey, he of the buzz-cut, beer-swilling ABC sitcom hit that carries his name. The harried young parents, Darryl and Wanda, will be voiced by Mike O’Malley and Julia Sweeney. Hoping to capture some of the comic strip’s millions of readers, the network is running back-to-back episodes on Fridays for the rest of the summer. If it catches on, Susanne Daniels, the network’s entertainment chief, expects “Baby Blues” to be back on the schedule midseason. Maybe it is about being a “survivor” after all.

There’s No Iceberg in Sight

Can anyone stand up to the real Slim Shady? Watch this week to see if Eminem can post a ninth consecutive week at No. 1 on the nation’s album charts, which would be the longest streak since the “Titanic” soundtrack sailed at the top spot for 16 weeks in early 1998. Eminem’s “The Marshall Mathers LP”--which enjoyed the second-best debut week sales in music history--has now racked up close to 5 million in total copies sold and the controversial Detroit rhymer seems ubiquitous in the press. Early retail reports suggest that Eminem will indeed make it nine weeks in a row, especially without any heavyweight new releases anywhere in sight. “As far as competition, there’s no big album lurking out there right now,” says Geoff Mayfield, director of charts for Billboard. “His best competition might end up being Britney Spears, actually.” That’s because Spears’ album “Oops! . . . I Did It Again” has been a steady No. 2 for most of Eminem’s streak and the gap between them is narrowing. Also, Spears will likely get a big bump in the next few weeks from several sources: the release of “Lucky,” a high-profile new single and video; her ongoing national tour (including a Saturday stop at the Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre in Irvine and shows July 30 and 31 at the Great Western Forum); and an ad campaign with McDonald’s to promote a new CD of Spears and ‘N Sync music that the fast-food giant will begin selling Aug. 4.

He’s Really Got Steam Heat

In a summer movie season packed with raunchy humor, dazzling sci-fi visual effects, cars peeling rubber and people seeing ghosts, it might be surprising to find a little steam engine named Thomas chugging into theaters across America. But make no mistake, this is no ordinary little train and it has a following as loyal as any “X-Men” fan club. On Wednesday, “Thomas and the Magic Railroad,” a feature-length film based on two popular children’s television shows--”Thomas the Tank Engine” and “Shining Time Station”--will open in theaters nationwide. Produced by Destination Films and Gullane Pictures, the film is written and directed by Britt Allcroft, who first brought Thomas and his whimsical friends to television two decades ago. The new film is aimed squarely at a segment of the moviegoing public often ignored by studios: kids between the ages of 3 and 7. It is a demographic that Disney knows well, but other studios rarely appreciate. “Folks that don’t have young children have no idea the strong bond that exists between children of this age and Thomas,” said Allcroft. It has been a long, twisting road to get “Thomas and the Magic Railroad” to the big screen. Barry London, then a top executive at Paramount Pictures, had urged Allcroft to turn the TV series into a feature film, but when he left his post, it fell to another studio, PolyGram, which expressed interest. After PolyGram was bought out, the project came full circle when London joined Destination. The movie began filming last August on the picturesque Isle of Man in the Irish Sea, then moved to Pennsylvania and Toronto. Blending live action, digital effects and traditional model animation, the film features a cast that includes Peter Fonda, Mara Wilson and Alec Baldwin as “Mr. Conductor.” When she first proposed her TV show two decades ago, Allcroft recalled, “there were a heck of a lot of doubters who said, ‘What kids would be interested in stories about steam trains?’ They would be proven wrong.”

--Compiled by Times Staff Writers