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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Classic TV

Lost Gems: Life Story

3 November 2008 Rob Buckley 11 Comments

Tim Piggott-Smith and Jeff Goldblum in Life Story

Earlier this year, I was bemoaning the fact that not only is there very little mainstream science programming, the stuff that is around is dumbed down almost to the extent that it’s completely worthless. Okay, so BBC4 is trying to fill in the gaps with things like The Story of Maths, but everywhere else, there’s nothing but rubbish.

Which is a shame, because the BBC used to produce some truly excellent science programmes, usually as part of its Horizon strand. Possibly the biggest jewel in its crown was Life Story, which was billed as a “Horizon special”. This was a feature-length dramatisation of the race by Francis Crick and James Watson against Rosalind Franklin and Maurice Wilkins in the 1950s to discover the secrets of the structure of DNA. It depicts how the quick-moving Crick and Watson were able to beat the more methodical Franklin and Wilkins to the discovery using Franklin and Wilkins’ own work – while still finding time to flesh out the characters of the scientists involved and give an unpleasantly accurate picture of the misogyny of 1950s Britain.

This was how to do science dramatisation. Step aside rubbish like Egypt, Life Story had Tim Pigott-Smith and Jeff Goldblum as Crick and Watson, and Juliet Stevenson and Alan Howard as Franklin and Wilkins. It had a script by William Nicholson (Shadowlands), based on Watson’s book The Double Helix, and direction by Mick Jackson (The Bodyguard). It ended up winning three awards, including a BAFTA for best single drama.

However, it was such a good dramatisation and the science was so accurate that it quickly became popular at universities and schools as a teaching aid. As a result, although it was made available as a VHS video, it was priced at the $160 institutional mark. It hasn’t been made available on DVD, it’s only been repeated a couple of times. It’s a Lost Gem.

Here’s the opening few minutes which sets the scene for the rest of the film.

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US TV

Review: 30 Rock 3×1

3 November 2008 Rob Buckley Post a comment

30 Rock

In the US: Thursdays, 9.30/8.30c, NBC
In the UK: Five, from January (probably)

Wake up, NBC! Wake up!

I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but Tina Fey has been something of a hot property of late. Thanks to her scary impersonation of Sarah Palin (here with Will Ferrell as George Bush), people all over the world are waking up to the fact that despite having been on and written for a recent season of SNL, she is in fact a comedy genius.

Not NBC though, because they’ve waited until the end of October to bring to our screens the latest season of 30 Rock. Set behind the scenes of a fictitious NBC sketch show, it features Tina Fey as the show’s bewildered liberal producer and Alec Baldwin as the interfering conservative executive in charge of Fey’s show, east coast programming and microwave ovens. And it’s easily the best comedy on television at the moment (yes, better than The Office, etc)

Well done, NBC. Would you like to look at your ratings? Scary, aren’t they? Want to start thinking a bit more in future, maybe, about how you could capitalise on events rather than simply staring at them blankly?

Of course, there may have been doubts about the show’s funniness. Would season three be as funny as previous seasons?

Don’t be silly. Of course it would.

Continue reading “Review: 30 Rock 3×1”

Review: Doctor Who – Brotherhood of the Daleks

3 November 2008 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

Brotherhood of the Daleks

Hands up anyone who’s not a Charley fan. Right, get out: you’re barred.

Since we’re now left only with people of pleasing intellect and taste, we can begin the review. First, as a brief aside, is "Nicholas Briggs as the Daleks" really a major selling point, worthy of the cover? Okay, so he does the TV voices, too, but who, other than committed fans, knows that and cares. More to the point, won’t they already be buying at least three copies of every Big Finish release already? You don’t think it’s because Briggsy is one of the Big Finish producers that his voicing mysteriously warrants a cover praise, do you?

Anyway, moving on. When you sit down to write a piece of intelligent fiction, more often than not, you tend to want to make it "multi-layered" – ie "not too basic". The audience need brain stimulation, you convince yourself, so let’s add some plot twists. All well and good so far.

The problem is when you go overboard and start to cackle to yourself as you add in every single plot twist and clever idea you can possibly think of. Suddenly, your play lurches from minute to minute like a rodeo bull, throwing off audience members willy nilly.

Oops Alan Barnes. I’m looking at you here.

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Sitting Tennant

Today’s Sitting Tennants (from Rullsenberg and Persephone): Love’s Labour’s Lost

3 November 2008 Rob Buckley 6 Comments

DT sitting down

Love's Labour's Lost

DT sitting

A veritable treasure trove has been found in the Sitting Tennant squat today. Rullsenberg and Persephone have located some pictures of David Tennant in Love’s Labours Lost and its rehearsals. Both submitted the third picture, while Ms Rullsenberg, obviously keen to leapfrog to the front of the pack, submitted all three. Feast on their loveliness.

That means the current Sitting Tennant league tables are as follows. For pictures, Rosby still in the lead now on seven entries. But both Persephone and Rullsenberg have five and a half points each, Toby has five, Poly and Scott both have three and a half points each, Anna and Jane have one and a half, while Marie has just one.

The Witty And Amusing Captions league table has changed a bit, too. Toby is still tops with 15 captions, Persephone has nine captions, Marie eight, and Jane Henry five and a half, thanks to a particularly current caption. Rullsenberg has five captions, Electric Dragon is still on four entries, Rev now has three entries and Poly and Stu_N have one each.

Feel free to leave captions below for this entry, too, and keep those eyes peeled for any new pictures of David Tennant sitting down that you can find. And yes, more bonus points for Love’s Labour’s Lost or other current pictures if you can find them.

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.