Month: January 2007

News

Wednesday’s mellow-out cool news

31 January 2007 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

Runaway Bride

Or maybe overly geeky news. Which do you think?

Doctor Who

  • Lots of Runaway Bride pictures.
  • An interview with Verity Lambert, first producer of Who (originally published in Dreamwatch in 2004, but they’re reviving their archive of material online)

Film

Music

US TV

  • Genre pilot pick-ups, including the US version of Life on Mars.
  • Futurama: Those new Comedy Central episodes are going to be re-edits of some Futurama movies coming to DVD.
  • Heroes: Masses of spoilers from E!’s Kristin.
  • From Ask Auriello:
    • Heroes: Malcolm McDowell might have a part.
    • Prison Break: What sort of things will happen in season three.
    • Studio 60: There’s going to be a flashback episode soon.
News

Tuesday’s news, you lucky people

30 January 2007 Rob Buckley 12 Comments

State of Play

It’s all just so exciting. And Spartan.

Doctor Who

  • John Simm might be appearing as… Go, on, spoil yourself, remembering it’s The Sun. There’s also a potential spoiler about Derek Jacobi’s character, the Professor.
  • A brief, slightly spoilery interview with Freema Agyeman.

Film

British TV

  • Miss the Celebrity Big Brother evictions? You can watch the final three at YouTube: Dirk, Jermaine and Shilpa. Isn’t it nice the final three were all non-Brits?
  • Channel 4 is to have a season/year of environmental programming.

US TV

TV reviews

Review: 12 Books That Changed The World

29 January 2007 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Melvyn Bragg

In the UK: Sundays, 5.30pm, ITV1

Everyone likes a good meme, right? It’s one of the joys of the “blogosphere”. Of course, blogs are Web 2.0 and tele is Web 0.0, so there’s no way really to interact with a meme that’s on television. Yet that’s what Melvyn Bragg has decided to do: create a meme.

What are the 12 most important books that changed the world as we know it?

Continue reading “Review: 12 Books That Changed The World”

Things I learnt from last week’s television

29 January 2007 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

24 (Fox)

There are ways to make family reunions bearable.

Celebrity Big Brother (Channel 4/E4)

People will watch anything. Judging by the ratings, racism is entertainment.



CSI (CBS)

Sometimes, the plots of even the best shows make absolutely no sense.



Heroes (NBC)

A week is a long, long time when a show is really, really enjoyable. I want the next episode now! Also, Christopher Eccleston will never be cast as anything except an angry northerner, no matter where in the world he’s employed.

Psych (The USA Network)

Give a show six months’ rest and when it comes back, sometimes, just sometimes, it will be better than when it went away.

Smallville (The CW)

Even when a plot has been done well by countless other TV shows, it’s still possible to do it again and still make it good, creepy and interesting. Also, actors who have been in shows for six years will remember how to act when they’re given something new to do for a change. Things we already knew: Clark is an idiot – go with Chloe, you nutter.

Studio 60 (NBC)

If you’re the hero of a TV show, you can act like a stalker and the girl will still want you by the end of the episode. It’s also really easy to learn Mandarin Chinese from a phrase book.

Supernatural (The CW)

If you’re doing a “monster of the week” show, don’t bring the same monster back – twice – unless you can actually make it interesting.

The Class (CBS)

If you piss off sitcom producers, they can excise you from the titles and publicity material faster than Stalin.

Troy Kennedy Martin season at the NFT

29 January 2007 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

The NFT has a season of Troy Kennedy Martin’s work running next month, with an interview with the man himself on the 6th February. In case you don’t know who he is, here’s the bumpf:

“Scriptwriter Troy Kennedy Martin has been responsible for some of the most memorable and innovative British TV. Beginning at the BBC in the late fifties, he worked on the revolutionary series Z Cars and then moved to ITV to write on the seminal seventies series, The Sweeney. Arguably his greatest work is the brilliant conspiracy thriller Edge of Darkness, and he has also written for film, including the classic caper movie The Italian Job.”

Among the season’s highlights are Diary of a Young Man, Edge of Darkness, and an episode of Fall of Eagles. Go watch Edge of Darkness if you’ve never seen it (shame on you! It’s the drama of the 80s); I’ll only be along for the interview on the 6th since everything else clashes with something else I’m already booked in for. Drat.