The Writer’s Guild of America sure did screw television over this year. Call us crazy, but there were certain TV shows that were never able to return to their pre-strike awesomeness, and there were certain TV shows who weren’t able to put the strike behind them (could Heroes be the only show that fits into both categories?).

Films, on the other hand, haven’t really begun to be effected yet. A lot of the scripts that were halted during the WGA strike of 07/08 are coming up for 2009’s production slate, and people are starting to wonder what that means for this year’s on-screen quality…

i09 has an article spotlighting some of the more heinous rushed re-writes and super-odd begging done by studios to get movies ready for the 2009 season. Take, for example, the summery of X-Men Origins: Wolverine and their rush into production:

X-Men: Origins: Wolverine.
What happened? According to the L.A. Times, this X-Men spinoff was rushing to get a script ready before the strike started. Fox Movies “issued an urgent SOS to the major agencies looking for a quick rewrite person” to get the script into shape in the last few remaining days, so Wolvie could start shooting in time to make a May 2009 release date.
What’s the damage? We know the script was bad enough that it needed a rewrite. We know the rewrite was done in a hurry by someone the studio found by begging the talent agencies to find someone quick. We don’t know how it turned out, though — maybe they got the greatest script doctor in the universe to step in. Also, it’s possible there were more rewrites after the strike ended. Note that the film extended its shooting, ending in May instead of April.

Repeat similar stories for G.I. Joe, Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen, Land of the Lost and Dragonball: Evolution, which might not have existed if it wasn’t for a sudden and costly writer’s strike.

You can read more abut the above specific examples here.