Despite long-standing rumors to the contrary, actress Emma Watson has reassured fans of the Potter film franchise that she will be appearing in the final two Harry Potter movies.

Once Michael Bay is through with “Transformers” he will move on to SF thriller “2012,” the story of a researcher who opens a portal into a future parallel universe, makes contact with his future self and together try to stop the coming apocalypse foretold by the ancient Mayan calendar. The film will be based on the popular Whitley Strieber novel.

“Picket Fences” star Kathy Baker has joined the cast of the new CBS dramedy “Babylon Fields.” The weekly series will focus on the everyday lives of people who have risen from the dead. Sort of a zombies in primetime.

YouTube is back in the news as the video sharing website announced it will hold its first annual YouTube Video Awards for 2006. Just last week the Google-owned enterprise was slapped with a $1 billion lawsuit by media giant Viacom, Inc. for copyright infringement.

Emmy winning writer/director Steven Bochco (“Hill Street Blues,” “L.A. Law”) joins a growing list of Hollywood heavy hitters to get on board the internet band wagon. He will write and produce a series of short web-exclusive videos. On our Slice of SciFi show this week we take a look at Michael Eisner’s new web project.

No SPOILERS Here:

The SCI FI Channel pulled a sneaky one this past Sunday by trimming down and airing the pilot episode of “The Dresden Files” as episode #7. The plot centered on a family torn by the loss of their daughter, with one member resorting to the black arts to reap vengence on those blamed for her death. Of course, Harry gets caught up in the middle of the whole thing. If this episode had been aired out of the gate as it should have been, as the actual pilot, then perhaps the show would have kept a larger audience in tow. It was nice seeing Harry finally act like Jim Butcher’s wizard.

If you thought “Battlestar Galactica” was already dark, then you better turn on the sunlamp because its about to get about three shades darker. In last night’s episode Helo dropped a bomb that fortells of even darker days ahead for the entire Colonial Fleet. With the trial of Gaius Baltar now in full swing, the decaying, crusty underbelly of some of the Fleet’s finest and highest is getting exposed… we see one rebel leader finally break under the strain, falling to near insanity and, the healing rift between father and son gets torn asunder revealing a cauldron of shared mistrust. Helo capsuled it best: “There is a BIG storm coming!”