UK TV

Mobisodes none too popular

16 October 2006 Rob Buckley 3 Comments

TardisodesApparently, those Doctor Who mobisodes (aka TARDISodes) were none too popular. Although 2.6 million people downloaded them onto their home computers, only 40,000 people watched them on their mobile phones.

Iain Tweedale, the new media editor for BBC Wales, points out that the pricing to download mobisodes – £1.50 to £2 – probably put a load of people off, particularly when all they had to do was watch them for free on their home computer. But I think there were a couple of other obvious problems:

  1. They were only a minute long and nothing happened in them really
  2. They didn’t feature either the Doctor or Rose.

So £2 to download something that wasn’t actually very interesting, £26 to download the whole season’s worth. You could get several DVDs for that price. I know which I’d rather watch.

Still, Lost is going to up the ante in the US with mobisodes that star the actual cast members, and Battlestar Galactica‘s webisodes already did more or less the same thing. So maybe next series’ will be better.

US TV

Third-episode verdict: Ugly Betty

13 October 2006 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

Ugly Betty

One of this year’s few break-outs, Ugly Betty deserves its much-praised status, I reckon. It’s actually one of the very few shows I’ve seen recently that I would describe as “charming”.

Betty Suarez’s continuing exploits in the world of fashion magazines are like bedtime stories for kids made into glossy, primary coloured television. Little that transpires has much to do with reality, particularly the reality of magazine publishing, but it doesn’t really matter in this fantasy world.

The show knows it is simplistic fare at heart and winks at the audience at opportune moments, but it avoids post-modern irony and simply embraces the good-natured Betty and her desire to get on in life through hard work and kind thoughts. Even the villains of the piece have their softer sides, with broken homes and broken hearts inspiring their random cruelty only until they become aware of what they’re really doing.

It’s soulful, fun and lovely basically. Avoid it if you’re looking for something deep and meaningful that says something about the grittiness of existence. But it’s an absolute must if you just want to watch something nice.

PS FYI, Ashley Jensen from Extras continues to amuse as Betty’s only real work friend, while another Gervais-collaborator, Lucy Davies from The Office (she also appears in Studio 60), is equally amusing in guest appearances as a fashion TV news anchor.

Title sequences: watch them ALL

13 October 2006 Rob Buckley Post a comment

A while back, we had minor fun trying to come up with some of the best and worst TV title sequences. Now some enterprising soul has started a blog, Main Title Heaven, that entirely consists of YouTube videos of TV title sequences – some good, some bad.

There’s mostly US shows on the list, many of which never aired in the UK or that have never re-aired, so now’s also a good chance to catch up on things like Policewoman with Angie Dickinson, Harry O, Banacek and (this one brought memories flooding back) Simon and Simon. Give Search a look-in, too, just to see Doug McLure during his heyday. Oh yes. And the “golden syrup” show, TJ Hooker.

But there’s also The Avengers (colour and black & white), The Professionals, UFO and a couple of other British shows, so don’t feel too excluded if you’re from the UK and don’t like US TV.

PS If you’re on a Mac, Safari will probably have problems with all those vids, but Firefox works just fine.