The Hollywood genre film landscape is starting to look like a field of battle, perhaps Verdun, or the Somme. The bodies of directors cruelly flung into the machine gun fire of fickle executives litter the streets of LA, nixed scripts rustling in the wind around their fallen remains.

First the rumour hardened that "Alias" and "Lost" creator J.J. Abrams had been dropped from the planned "Star Trek XI". Then Filmstalker reported that David S. Goyer had been given the shiv in the kidneys and jetisoned from the comic book adaption "The Flash".

But the deepest cut of all to fans' souls came today. It seems that Joss Whedon, he of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", "Angel" and "Firefly"/"Serenty", has gotten the boot from the long awaited "Wonder Woman".

Whedonesque, which keeps an eye on all things Whedon, has confirmation from the man himself. In a post on the site he left the following message:

Joss Whedon

I'm no longer slated to make Wonder Woman. What? But how? My chest... so tight! Okay, stay calm and I'll explain as best I can. It's pretty complicated, so bear with me. I had a take on the film that, well, nobody liked. Hey, not that complicated.

Let me stress first that everybody at the studio and Silver Pictures were cool and professional. We just saw different movies, and at the price range this kind of movie hangs in, that's never gonna work. Non-sympatico. It happens all the time. I don't think any of us expected it to this time, but it did. Everybody knows how long I was taking, what a struggle that script was, and though I felt good about what I was coming up with, it was never gonna be a simple slam-dunk. I like to think it rolled around the rim a little bit, but others may have differing views.

The worst thing that can happen in this scenario is that the studio just keeps hammering out changes and the writer falls into a horrible limbo of development. These guys had the clarity and grace to skip that part. So I'm a free man.

Well, sorta. There is that "Goners" movie I can finally finish polishing, and plenty of other things in the hopper I've wanted to pursue. I'm as relieved as I am disappointed, and both of those things lead to drink, so that's a plus. Truly, you may be hearing some interesting things brewing in the coming months. But all potential jets therein will be visible.

But most importantly, I never have to answer THAT question again!!!! And you don't have to link to every rumor site! Finally and forever: I never had an actress picked out, or even a consistant front-runner. I didn't have time to waste on casting when I was so busy air-balling on the script. (No! Rim! There was rim!) That's the greatest relief of all. I can do interviews again!

Just the other day news broke that Warner Bros. and producer Joel Silver had bought a second script for the film, by Matthew Jennison and Brent Strickland, which was a tad ominous, considering Whedon had been working on a script for nigh on two years. The Jennison-Strickland script is allegedly set against the backdrop of World War II, while Whedon's script had a contemporary setting.

The only consolation would be that with Whedon suddenly having some free time on his hands, perhaps he might be persuaded to put some thought into the discarded idea of Buffyverse made for TV movies.