TV reviews

A complete archive of The Medium is Not Enough’s reviews of TV programmes since 2005

TV reviews

Doctor Who – 6×3 – The Curse of the Black Spot

7 May 2011 Rob Buckley 17 Comments

In the UK: Saturday 7th May, 6.15pm, BBC1/BBC1 HD. Available on the iPlayer
In the US: Saturday 7th May, 9pm/8c, BBC America

Well, not feeling very inspired to write a full review. It was a bit rubbish to be honest, beyond the recurring motif of the woman behind the wall with the eyepatch. And that’s despite the fact that I love pretty much anything involving old ships and sailing.

So as requested, it’s an open thread – let us all know what you thought either in the comments, or through a link to your blog where you’ve gone the distance and reviewed it yourself.

UK TV

Review: The Shadow Line 1×1

7 May 2011 Rob Buckley 12 Comments

The Shadow Line

In the UK: Thursdays, 9pm, BBC2. Available on the iPlayer

Writer/director/producer of BBC2’s new thriller The Shadow Line, Hugo Blick, would have us think of BBC2 as the UK’s version of HBO. Aside from the fact that there aren’t nearly enough repeats or boxing on BBC2 for that to be true, I’m not entirely convinced that just looking at drama – or even just as The Shadow Line – that you could make that mistake.

Sure, it’s got a good cast, including Christopher Eccleston, Chiwetel Ejiofor and Lesley Sharp. It’s beautifully directed and concerns the kind of difficult subject matters that HBO used to be associated with, including drug dealing and contract killing. There’s the occasional bit of swearing, too, although nowhere near the levels of The Wire or Al Swearengen in Deadwood.

One might even stretch a point and say that although HBO doesn’t really do “Lynchian weird”, the general weirdness of The Shadow Line pales into insignificance compared to the weirdness of John from Cincinnati, even if that show was somewhat unique in HBO’s history.

But arguably, as a drama, The Shadow Line is so slow-moving, so off the wall and so anti-realistic, “BBC2 is the UK’s AMC” would be more accurate.

Here’s a BBC clip, because the BBC in their wisdom haven’t bothered to stick any decent trailers on YouTube. Sorry, US readers.

Continue reading “Review: The Shadow Line 1×1”

US TV

What have you been watching this week (w/e May 6)?

6 May 2011 Rob Buckley 7 Comments

Hipster Penny in Happy Endings

My usual recommendations for maximum viewing pleasure this week: Community, Cougar Town, The Daily Show, Doctor Who, Endgame, Happy Endings, House, Modern Family, Stargate Universe and 30 Rock. Watch them (and keep an eye on The Stage‘s TV Today Square Eyes feature as well) or you’ll be missing out on the good stuff.

Just a few thoughts on a couple of the regulars:

  • Last week’s attempt on Smallville to copy Spartacus was dreadful, even if it did have Callum BestBlue as Zod in it. Still Supergirl’s in this week’s episode and after that, it’s the final episode ever and Lex is back for that, so I’m sticking with it it.
  • Happy Endings – some great moments in both episodes, particularly "the Hipster makeover" and "you’re a gaycist", but also a few touching romantic moments. It’s at least as funny as Modern Family now.
  • Chuck – the ending was obvious but I enjoyed this week’s more than I’ve enjoyed a lot of the previous weeks’ episodes.
  • Doctor Who – couldn’t quite work up the energy to review the two-part The Impossible Astronaut/Day of the Moon and since it’s clearly a three-parter in disguise, there were so many plot threads left hanging at the end, it was almost impossible to review it anyway. At times, I did feel like the Silence had wiped my memory, since things seemed to jump around an awful lot without explanation (where did the people who still hadn’t quite got to the Moon in an Apollo spacecraft get white dwarf star alloy from? Why did the Doctor, Amy and Rory need to be chased down? How come Amy missed and what happened next? What was Nixon doing inside the prison?). You could probably fill in the gaps with a bit of work, but it does feel like all the working out has been scribbled over. All the same, there were some wonderfully clever bits, wonderfully scary bits and so much tease, there had better be a good pay-off or I’m going to… well, sulk probably. And how come they went to the US for the first time and ending up getting two Brits/Irish people, Mark Sheppard and W Morgan Sheppard, to play the lead American?

Since the last "What have you been watching?", I’ve tried

  • Burn Notice: The Fall of Sam Axe – basically, exactly like every Bruce Campbell straight-to-DVD movie of the 90s. If that’s your thing, watch it. If it’s not, don’t.
  • Stewart Lee’s Comedy Vehicle – Glad to see a move away from the grumpy old man routine of last series, aided by some pointless sketches, to his more traditional stand-up. Very funny, brilliantly clever and had the best Godzilla reference of the week.

Anyone watch The Shadow Line – I taped it but I hear it might have been a bit rubbish. And as mentioned earlier this week, stupid scheduling meant that I didn’t watch Exile or Case Sensitive – were they any good (thanks to everyone who’s already weighed in on this)?

But what have you been watching?

"What have you been watching this week?" is your chance to recommend to friends and fellow blog readers the TV that they might be missing or should avoid – and for me to do mini-reviews of everything I’ve watched this week. Since we live in the fabulous world of Internet catch-up services like the iPlayer and Hulu, why not tell your fellow readers what you’ve seen so they can see the good stuff they might have missed?

UK TV

Review: Engrenages (Spiral) 3×9-3×10

1 May 2011 Natalia Romanova 9 Comments

Bremont in BBC4's Spiral

In France: Some time last Summer
In the UK: Saturday 30th April, 9pm, BBC4. iPlayer: Episode 9, Episode 10

And so it is that as we enter the penultimate week of season 3 of Spiral, the show enters into something of a – how you say? – a high gear?

So let’s talk about alleged rape, unsuspecting rape, planned rape, prostitution rings and mistranslations from the French after the jump – and two gratuitous pictures of Josephine Karlsson (the BBC4 web site knows what it likes) and a teaser trailer that Canal+ put out where the most popular characters describe themselves, which I thought was quite interesting so decided to share.

Karlsson in Engrenages

Karlsson in Engrenages

Continue reading “Review: Engrenages (Spiral) 3×9-3×10”

What have you been watching this week (w/e April 29)?

29 April 2011 Rob Buckley 17 Comments

My usual recommendations for maximum viewing pleasure this week: Archer, Community, Cougar Town, The Daily Show, Endgame, Modern Family, Stargate Universe and 30 Rock. Watch them (and keep an eye on The Stage‘s TV Today Square Eyes feature as well) or you’ll be missing out on the good stuff. I’ve also decided to add Happy Endings to the recommended viewing, since although it can be a bit silly, it is consistently funny.

Just a few thoughts on a couple of the regulars:

  • Loved last week’s episode of Community – a clips show with clips from episodes that don’t actually exist. How awesome is that?
  • Stargate Universe almost made me cry this week, which is kind of pathetic I know, but TJ getting motor neurone disease was just upsetting.
  • Smallville – Booster Gold turns up. So a bit rubbish basically. Still not long to the final ever episode.

Since the last “What have you been watching?”, I’ve tried

  • Game of Thrones, but gave up after 15 minutes since it seemed very dull. I might be wrong on that, but then fantasy books have never really been my thing.
  • I also dipped back into Hellcats, just to see what they did with Aly Michalka’s sister, who they’ve got to play… her long-lost sister. They didn’t do much though and since most of the rest of the episode was actually quite dreadful Kids From Fame stuff, I decided not to bother watching any more of it and was glad I gave up a while back.

I did record The Crimson Petal and the White, The Suspicions of Mr Whicher and United, but didn’t watch them. Were they any good?

But what have you been watching?

“What have you been watching this week?” is your chance to recommend to friends and fellow blog readers the TV that they might be missing or should avoid – and for me to do mini-reviews of everything I’ve watched this week. Since we live in the fabulous world of Internet catch-up services like the iPlayer and Hulu, why not tell your fellow readers what you’ve seen so they can see the good stuff they might have missed?