It’s probably gone inexplicably beneath most people’s radar, but last week’s Guardian Science Weekly Podcast (and podcast extra) feature interviews with John Barrowman (you know, Captain Jack in Doctor Who and Torchwood) as he’s led round CERN (the European centre for nuclear research) by Dr Brian Cox (Hannibal Lecktor. No, hang on, it’s another Brian Cox).
Just thought I’d let you know in case you missed it for some reason.
I’m back from Norfolk. Ah Norfolk. Home of grey clouds and torrential rain blistering sunshine, beautiful broads and FRESH ASPARAGUS. Everywhere, as far as the eye can see, FRESH ASPARAGUS.
Anyway, I’ve spent the last week in a technology deprivation tank, to reduce potential stress from the encroachment of this modern life on my holiday. No Internet. No phone. No TV.
Yes. No TV.
Even an iPod fitted with a pair of speakers to provide music nearly hurled me over the edge. I was like some character in The Changes, ready to beat anything modern into dust using the nearest available ploughshare.
I did read some books. I’d almost forgotten how. For the curious, I burned my way through
So I haven’t watched a thing, not even Doctor Who. I’ll be getting round to rectifying that over the next day or so. And over the next week, I have all manner of shiny things to do: I even have a new plan for now somewhat lazy Carusometer. Fingers crossed, I might get some of them done.
And yes, I am the kind of guy who takes pictures of local television stations while I’m on holiday. Why do you ask?
Altogether now, “Live from Norwich, it’s The Sale of the Century!”…
Although it seems like I’ve been back since I went on my pilgrimage, I’m off for a week to Norfolk for a well-earned vacation. They don’t have the Internet in Norfolk, apparently, so the chances of my blogging anything – particularly the daily news page – are quite small, but I should be back at the start of June.
Happily, the next episode of Doctor Who is a two-parter so I can pretend to be taking the reviewing high ground and pick holes in the pair of them when I get back. I’ll leave you under the watchful gaze of The Carusometer until I return, so enjoy yourselves!
Time to induct two new members to the group of people elevated to God-like status: Douglas Camfield and Graeme Harper. They’re not especially well known names, except within a certain group of (charitably) TV aficionados or (less charitably) geeks. But they are two of the best directors Doctor Who and possibly British TV has ever seen.
Now it would be unfair to say that early Doctor Who didn’t have very good direction. Directed by Waris Hussein, the opening episode, An Unearthly Child, was a particularly splendid piece of work: whenever Anna and I talk about how flat some episodes have looked, I at least am thinking of An Unearthly Child as an example of how well lit and directed Doctor Who can be (Anna can tell you what she’s thinking about!).
Here below is the opening to the world’s longest running sci-fi series. Imagine it’s 1963. Kid’s TV has been Muffin the Mule and Bill and Ben. There are no synthesisers, special effects or anything else on television. Then this hits the scene at Saturday tea time. Just how severely blown away would you have been?
But post-Unearthly Child, it all went a bit flat. After all, we’re talking about a show that initially had to put out a new episode every week, all year round, with no budget, no time, no real ability to do re-takes if scenes messed up and technical issues aplenty. It’s a miracle the sets stayed up.
Douglas Camfield was one of the first to change that.
Continue reading “People Elevated to God-like Status: two new members”
Well, if ever you’re worried that Lost is just going to run around in circles, never getting anywhere, the third season finale should dispel that thought immediately. We got pay-offs, answers, a bucket load of new questions, and – the so-called “snake in the mailbox” game-changer, which unfortunately I guessed and you might too – a twist right at the end that lets you know what the exec producers have planned for the next few seasons.
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