Archer

Tuesday’s “Downton SMASH” news

20 September 2011 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Film

British TV

Canadian TV

  • The Daily Show‘s Samantha Bee and Lolita Davidovich join Good Dog

US TV

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?

What have you been watching this week (w/e April 15)?

15 April 2011 Rob Buckley 3 Comments

My usual recommendations for maximum viewing pleasure this week: Archer, Community, The Daily Show, 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.

Separate reviews of this week’s episodes of Spiral/Engrenages are over here, but this is what else I’ve been watching this week:

  • Being Human (US) – an interesting way to end a series that actually became a lot more interesting over the course of the season than its first couple of episodes would have suggested. Once it found its feet, starting picking and choosing from the UK original and then twisting it to its own ends while sticking to the same template, it actually became better than the original in a lot (but not all) ways. It was actually able to take things that had been squished into a single episode and let them breath over a couple of episodes. To avoid Internet spoilers, the finale really wasn’t what you might have expected if you’d seen the original – and actually used expectations of what happened in the original to mislead you. So looking forward to the next season now!
  • Breaking In: Cleverer than the first episode and Alyssa Milano was rather a good guest star. But not really very funny at all and I don’t really care about any of the characters.
  • Chaos: after an acceptable start, episode two was actually rather dull, despite some quite nice spy stuff. James Murray’s toned down his Scottish accent a lot – and now is starting to sound English a lot more. Not awful, but not worth tuning in for. Disappointing.
  • Chuck was quite fun, but Chuck’s just a dull character now, Sarah still really hasn’t got a character and what’s happened to Linda Hamilton? The family Volkoff are the only things to look forward to on this show now.
  • Endgame was really quite excellent, bar a slightly disappointing ending, so it’s going to be promoted to the “you should watch” bit at the bottom
  • Happy Endings: Coming to a separate review near you, soon!

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

What have you been watching this week (w/e April 8)?

8 April 2011 Rob Buckley 4 Comments

Channel 4's Campus

My usual recommendations for maximum viewing pleasure are: Archer, Being Human (US), The Daily Show and Stargate Universe. 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 done quite a lot of reviewing of first-run shows this week – here’s a list, so you have my in-depth feelings on those:

Endgame was quite fun this week, although massively, massively implausible (spoiler: the girl died of an allergic reaction to the bee pollen in her honey ice cream), and if it carries on at this rate, I’ll be adding it to my list of regular recommendations very soon.

I tried Channel 4’s Campus – if you’re a student and therefore too young to have seen actual comedy before, you might have thought this was good; for everyone else, it would have been less enjoyable than self-vivisection. A couple of amusing moments, but largely it seemed impressed by its ability to SAY THE UNTHINKABLE. Unthinkable, that is, if you’re the kind of person who regards swearing and shirking at work as being crimes that should carry the death penalty. Otherwise, very tame.

However, I’ve still to get through BBC1’s Candy Cabs, Comedy Central’s Workaholics and BBC2’s The Crimson Petal and the White – I’ll get through them in due course, but does anyone have good or bad things to say about any of them in the interim?

"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?

US TV

What have you been watching this week (w/e April 2)?

2 April 2011 Rob Buckley 4 Comments

Ron Swanson

My usual recommendations for maximum viewing pleasure are: Archer, Being Human (US), The Daily Show, The Killing, Shameless (US) and Stargate Universe. 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.

This week, after only three seasons, I’ve given the much-hyped Parks and Recreation a try. Starring Amy Poehler and Rob Lowe, this was supposed to be NBC’s sleeper comedy – the one for people who want to feel smug towards people who watch Community and think they’ve discovered the best niche comedy nobody’s watching.

However, with the exception of Ron, the wonderfully moustached real man character, this was probably the unfunniest thing I’ve seen in quite a while. Even Good Dog was considerably better. It might be because it’s episode eight and no one’s putting their best foot forward, but Portlandia does almost everything in it but better and you’d be hard pressed to find an actual joke. Ron was good though. Can anyone tell me what I’m missing?

“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?