As we noticed with The Plot Against America, most parallel history sci-fi TV is obsessed with the Second World War. True, we get the occasional exception, such as For All Mankind or 1983, but largely, it’s 101 explorations of what would have happened if the Nazis had won the war.
That at least makes Motherland – Fort Salem a refreshing change, since rather than being a twist on just 20th century history, it’s a feminist twist of pretty much all of American history. Here, we start with the Salem Witch Trials and imagine not only what would have happened if witches genuinely were supernatural, but also what they would have done if they’d agreed to put their powers to use for the state.
Imagine 300+ years of history in which the only soldiers were women and they fought using magic instead of weaponry.
Unfortunately, Motherland – Fort Salem also decides that the only really interesting thing about that potentially highly exciting set-up is who’s shagging whom and who’s in and out of what High School-esque clique at any one time. It’s more Pretty Little Liars: The Illusionists than anything else.
Cabin Pressure is one of the finest sitcoms ever to grace the radio airwaves. It ended a few years ago now (gah, 2014!), mainly due to Benedict Cumberbatch’s sudden fame thanks to Sherlock but also because each episode started with a different letter of the alphabet and they ran out of letters.
It is much missed.
But there seems to be a lot of Cabin Pressure about, all of a sudden. Inept air steward Arthur Shappey’s grandson is currently piloting spaceships on Avenue 5 (US: ABC; UK: Sky1).
And Arthur himself is currently trying to help us all survive quarantine with Cabin Fever, the first episode of which is naturally set in Fitton.
Brilliant!
There happen to be some important nuWho anniversaries happening around now. Apparently, it’s some anniversary or other for Day of the Doctor and Steven Moffat has written a new introduction for it featuring Dan Starkey as Strax (who introduced the cinema version, if you recall).
The observant may notice a few references to/potshots at the most recent season of Doctor Who…
Meanwhile, coming up on Thursday, Russell T Davies will be live Tweeting for the 15th anniversary of Rose. There’ll be some extra material released on the day, too.
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