Articles by Rob Buckley

About Rob Buckley
I’m Rob Buckley, a journalist who writes for UK media magazines that most people have never heard of although you might have heard me on the podcast Lockdown Land or Radio 5 Live’s Saturday Edition or Afternoon Edition. I’ve edited Dreamwatch, Sprocket and Cambridge Film Festival Daily; been technical editor for TV producers magazine Televisual; reviewed films for the short-lived newspaper Cambridge Insider; written features for the even shorter-lived newspaper Soho Independent; and was regularly sarcastic about television on the blink-and-you-missed-it “web site for urban hedonists” The Tribe. Since going freelance, I've contributed to the likes of Broadcast, Total Content + Media, Action TV, Off The Telly, Action Network, TV Scoop and The Custard TV.
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The Heroes, Chuck and Medium Superbowl promos

2 February 2009 Rob Buckley 3 Comments

The US Superbowl is a traditional time for Americans to get together, eat snacks, party and watch lots of commercials that are occasionally interrupted by some football. Some Superbowl commercials are classics that live in history – can you believe it’s been 25 years since Ridley Scott directed the legendary first ever advert for the Apple Mac way back in 1984?

Most don’t though. Oh well.

But with a vast, near-captive audience, NBC gets the chance to

  1. up promo rates and still show lots of exclusive ads (see today’s news for some movie spots)
  2. promote its own programmes

Here, for instance, is a great big sing- and-dance-a-long involving the casts of Chuck, Heroes and Medium. Yes, Yvonne Strahovski can do a good high kick.

As well as that combo, Heroes got not just one but two dedicated promos: a standard “clips from the next episode” promo

But as pointed out on Thursday, there was also a specially shot promo with various Heroes playing football against NFL players – and having to use their powers to stand a chance of winning.

Me being me, I can’t help but notice that someone who was there for the filming and appeared to have shot some footage for the ad, didn’t appear in the final thing at all except if you look really, really hard between 0:17 to 0:20 . Sigh.

Monday’s snowed-in Superbowl news

2 February 2009 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

Doctor Who

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Sitting Tennant

Today’s Sitting Tennant (from Jaradel, Rullsenberg and Rosby): Driving to Hamlet

30 January 2009 Rob Buckley 13 Comments

David Tennant

David Tennant driving

David Tennant in his own car David Tennant in Hamlet

What’s that coming over the hill? Is it a monster? No, it’s actually four pictures of David Tennant sitting down, and for the most part, driving – what are you? Blind?

Yes. it’s time for this week’s Sitting Tennant, and the call to photo-arms has been answered by not one, not two, but three devoted Tennant lovers: Mesdames Rullsenberg, Jaradel and Rosby.

With the exception of the triumphal return entry from last year’s runner-up Rosby, who gets the bonus half point for a topical picture from Hamlet, they’re all of Wavy Davy driving – or using his heat vision in the case of Ms Jaradel’s submission.

This gives us the following exciting new picture competition leader board, Ms Rullsenberg having provided two of the pictures:

  1. Rullsenberg: 3
  2. Jaradel: 2
  3. Rosby: 1.5

Exciting, huh? Won’t anyone else come in to play?

Meanwhile, back at the caption competition, there’s been a switch at the top. Although the photo lended itself somewhat to topical captions, resulting in a lot of half points being handed out, Marie has been overtaken by Toby, who used the simple mechanism of writing three captions to take the lead. And for the first time, we have a tie for wittiest caption, with both Persephone and new entrant Scott getting double points.

That means everyone’s very nicely spaced out now:

  1. Toby: 8
  2. Marie: 7
  3. Jane Henry: 6
  4. Rev/Views, Rullsenberg: 5
  5. Persephone: 4
  6. Scott, Jaradel: 3
  7. Aaron: 2

As always, captions and new submissions for the gallery, please. Remember, you can submit as many (witty) captions as you like for each and every picture, with topical captions (and pictures of David Tennant in current productions) getting extra marks. The wittiest caption for each picture will get double points.

Got a picture of David Tennant sitting, lying down or in some indeterminate state in between? Then leave a link to it below and if it’s judged suitable, it will appear in the “Sitting Tennant” gallery. You can also enter the witting and amusing captions league table by commenting on existing photos in the gallery.

Friday’s “I have the power!” news

30 January 2009 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Doctor Who

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  • Lauren Graham pilot gets a green light
  • CBS greenlights three new drama pilots
  • Promo for Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles promises fresh start
  • Life on Mars‘ ratings not good