24: As long as something exciting happens all the time, I can watch the most mindless drivel.
30 Rock: Manatee. Hee, hee!
Battlestar Galactica: It is possible for Starbuck to be boring.
Heroes: Even people you suspect can’t act will start acting if you give them something to do. “Claire-bear” can reduce a grown man to tears. Sniff.
Jericho: Flashbacks are only interesting if you give a monkey’s about the flasher. If you know what I mean.
Lewis: Occasionally the writers can be funny. Lewis “not a professional Northerner”? Hee hee!
Lost: Oh yes. Lost used to be fun. I remember now.
Primeval: As long as something exciting happens all the time, I can watch the most mindless drivel. Also, the right backing track for a flock of dodos is Kasabian’s “Club Foot”.
The Unit: Eric Haney should be allowed to write episodes, too, not just Lynn Mamet as I suggested last week – another lesson learned. Also, all previous attempts to write realistic war dialogue have been rubbish: if it was authentic, we wouldn’t understand a word of it, as Haney has just proved. I had to watch it twice to work out what was going on.
Battlestar Galactica
Monday’s March news
Doctor Who
- Video footage of the possible last scene for John Barrowman in the next series of Doctor Who. No sound to spoil things
- David Tennant’s video diary is on YouTube, now the Beeb has done a deal with Google
Film
- There’s a film version of Death of Superman on the way. Adam Baldwin is the voice of Supes (it’s animated)
- Idris Elba talks about 28 Weeks Later
- Balactus. Sorry, Galactus will be in the Fantastic Four sequel
- The British government messes up the tax system again
- Gerard Butler might be in Watchmen
- Daniel Radcliffe’s up for the last two Harry Potter movies
Art
- David Lynch has a disturbing art show in Paris
British TV
- Neil Gaiman gets bewildered by the UK release of Neverwhere
US TV
- Sort of spoilers for Tuesday’s House. And for The Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Doll. Yey?
- Chris Showerman (what did his ancestors do?) has been cast as Flash Gordon
- Spoilers for Heroes. And more spoilers. And more!
- Sarah Connor Chronicles talk. Yes, Summer Glau is an evil female terminator
- Joss Whedon talks about Buffy, Firefly, Wonder Woman and the Buffiverse movies that never happened
- How Lost got a VW camper van onto the island
- Spoilers for BSG
- Pamela Anderson has a new TV show in the works
- Amber Tamblyn is to star in the disturbing Babylon Fields pilot
- 24 spoilers
US TV
Muck and BSG: let’s speak outer space
Before I lay my weary head to sleep, I thought I’d leave you with this passing thought about Sunday’s episode of Battlestar Galactica. Don’t worry, UK viewers, it won’t be spoilery, really.
There’s a point where Gaius Baltar (as played by James Callis) reveals that the posh English accent he’s been using since the start of the mini-series is a complete fake. He’s actually from the farming colony of Airlon (or is that Arelon? It’s derived from ‘Aries’ and rhymes with bear-lon, which is a word I’ve just made up, so you work it out).
Then he lapses into his true accent, which is remarkably similar to a Yorkshire accent, James Callis having gone to university in York.
Now, okay, everyone else from Caprica, the posh Southern pansy BSG colony, sounds American, including the secret Brits and Canadians, so it’s not like there’s one accent per colony. But the dialogue leading up to that moment seems to suggest that everyone from Airlon speaks with a similar accent.
So my thought for the day is this: is Baltar now going to be the only character on BSG to have come from Airlon, or can we expect one of the following:
- Lots of Yorkshire actors getting cast in BSG
- Lots of American and Canadian actors trying to fake a Yorkshire accent under James Callis’ tutelage
- Lots of British actors who aren’t from Yorkshire trying to fake a Yorkshire accent?
I do hope it’s number 3. You just can’t get away with crap regional accents on British TV any more, so it would be just fabby if former culprits Nigel Havers et al could be jetted off to Canada to give out soaring renditions of “Ee bah gum! Ya daft ‘apeth, Adama! Dooant trust t’ cylons. Those robots are evil. Naw launch t’ vipers.”
On the other hand, which of your favourite Yorkshire actors would you like to see in BSG? Patrick Stewart? Keith Barron? Sean Bean? Or even – and you know you want it bad – Brian Blessed?
What I learned by watching television last week
24: Never give jessie-wuss girls a gun because they’ll never use it, even when it could shorten a whole season and save the US
30 Rock: Is getting seriously cerebral. I thought Numb3rs was the only show on tele that could talk about “transitive properties”
Battlestar Galactica: James Callis can do a pretty good Yorkshire accent (he did go to the University of York, apparently); the class war will continue in space
The Class: Adultery is perfectly acceptable if your husband mixes you up with one of his ex-wives.
CSI: William Petersen’s beards can be used as plot development
Heroes: Is just so cool
Lost: Some flashbacks can be amazingly tedious and pointless and should be best left forgotten
Numb3rs: Just occasionally, Ken Sanzel can write a good episode. It’s still not great, though, not even though it’s ripping off 24
Studio 60: If you’re going to go, go out on a bang or your chances of ever coming back are scuppered.
The Unit: It’s possible to make the LA metro look like the Berlin underground system. A bit.
News
Wednesday’s news and catching up
Doctor Who
- Hugh Grant is in talks to appear as a baddie. Plus he claims he could have been the Doctor, too.
Film
- Lots of Transformers pics.
Theatre
- Peter Egan stars in a new production of Hound of the Baskervilles.
British TV
- Marco Pierre White comes out of retirement to replace Gordon Ramsay in Hell’s Kitchen. You should read what Gordon has to say about him in his biography. [free registration required]
- Actors appearing in the new Blake’s 7 audio plays will get royalties [subscription required].
- Heroes gives the SciFi channel its best ratings ever. That’s a 4.4% share or less than half a mill, by the way.
- Big Brother partworks? De Agostini may be after Endemol.
US TV
- I previewed it a very long time ago, but The Black Donnellys is nearly here now and you can see that first episode (yes, you, too, UK viewers) for free over on Yahoo! TV.
- George Takei strikes back against homophobic basketball players in a slightly unexpected way.
- Pioneering new levels of tastelessness in reality TV, Spike now wants amateur detectives to solve real-life murder cases in just 48 hours. But it’s for charity, so that’s all right then, isn’t it?
- The last (?) episode of Studio 60 gets really bad ratings.
- Ausiello talks to David Eick about Battlestar Galactica and reveals that the movie now has the green light, spoilers about the last four episodes of the season and spoilers about the next season.
- Also from Ausiello: Nancy Cartwright (aka Bart Simpson) will be appearing in 24 and lots of Lost spoilers.
- Jewel Staite from Firefly is joining Stargate: Atlantis, as are Stargate regulars Amanda Tapping, as we know, and Christopher Judge (although only for one episode). Torri Higginson (Dr Weir) has been demoted to recurring character status. Plus thoughts from exec producer Joseph Mallozzi. Looks, judging from the comments, like fans aren’t happy about any of it…
- Heroes spoilers over on Kristin’s E! blog
- Pilots, pilots, pilots. Notably Linus Roache is in a pilot with Juliana Margulies and Beau Bridges is a comedy bigamist.