So in case you hadn’t noticed, the new trend in TV is to take a cheesy old sci-fi series and update it with serious storylines and complex characters. It’s the Battlestar Galactica runoff, with NBC launching a new Bionic Woman show this year and The Sci-Fi Channel giving us a new Flash Gordon series as well. I have to wonder how Flash Gordon could end up being taken seriously at all, but then again, I probably would have thought the same thing about Battlestar Galactica a few years ago. It doesn’t help that they keep promoting it with the Queen theme song from the 80’s feature film, even though they claim it won’t actually be used in the show. Apparently it’s not quite as dark as BSG, which is probably for the best. The new show premieres in only a few weeks, and I’m a bit surprised we haven’t seen anything more than this super short promo teaser just released online. According to one review over at TV Squad, screeners of the pilot episode that were sent out were still missing effects shots, so it seems like they are racing to get it finished in time. The new show stars Eric Johnson (who played Whitney Fordman on Smallville) as Flash and John Ralston (Life with Derek) as Ming the Merciless. Check out the teaser and a photo gallery over at the official website (linked below). Flash Gordon premieres on Friday August 10th at 9 pm EST.