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Saturday, 16 August 2008
Old Post,2008
Breaking Bad Sunday 28 September 2008, FX – US comedy/drama created by X-Files co-producer Vince Gilligan. Stars Malcolm in the Middle's Bryan Cranston as Walter White, a struggling teacher with a handicapped child and pregnant wife. When he is diagnosed with terminal lung cancer, he sets up a meth lab to support his family. With Anna Gunn as his wife Skyler, who stays at home and sells items on eBay, RJ Mitte as teenage son Walter, Aaron Paul as Jesse Pinkman, Walter's drug business partner, Dean Norris as DEA agent/Walter's brother-in-law Hank Schrader and Betsy Brandt as Hank's wife Marie.
American Gladiators Tuesday 2 September 2008, Sky One – US version of the game show hosted by Hulk Hogan and Laila Ali, daughter of Muhammad Ali.
Desperate Housewives Wednesday 3 September 2008, Channel 4 – A resumption of series four of the US comedy drama.
Law & Order: Criminal Intent Monday 1 September 2008, Hallmark – Series six of the US crime drama.
Ross Kemp On Gangs Monday 1 September 2008, Sky One – Series four of the documentary series, featuring gangs in Liverpool, Los Angeles, Belize, Kenya and Bulgaria.
Ugly Betty Friday 5 September 2008, Channel 4 – A resumption of series two of the US comedy drama.
Underbelly Monday 29 September 2008, FX – A 13-part Australian television mini-series series, based on the 1995–2004 gangland war in Melbourne.
Greatest Dishes in the World autumn 2008, UKTV Food – Five-parter presented by Naomi Cleaver in which leading chefs cook a celebrated dish, which is judged by food critics Matthew Fort and Charles Campion.
Kylie Kwong: My China autumn 2008, UKTV Food – Series featuring the Australian chef exploring China's diverse cuisine.
Food Safari autumn 2008, UKTV Food – Series two of food writer Maeve O’ Meara culinary tour of Australia.
Glutton for Punishment autumn 2008, UKTV Food – Series two of the programme featuring ‘culinary adventurer’ Bob Blumer.
It'll Be Alright On The Night ITV1 – Return of the bloopers show, with Griff Rhys Jones replacing Denis Norden as host.
Driving Mum And Dad Wild Tuesday 2 September 2008, BBC3 – Documentary in which Joe Pritchard, a gay hairdresser, and Verity Abrahams, are taught to drive by their parents.
Good Arrows ITV4 – Comic mockumentary by Trainspotting writer Irvine Welsh about a darts player who loses his nerve and tries various remedies to regain his form. Stars Jonathan Owen as Andy ‘The Arrows’ Sampson with Ella Smith as his wife Big Sheila.
The What In The World? Quiz Five – Comedy science and nature quiz presented by Marcus Brigstocke with teams captained by Lee Hurst and Dominic Holland.
Chop Shop Discovery – Return of the car bodywork series featuring Leepu Awlia and Bernie Freeman. The 10-parter sees the pair customising cars owned by celebrities including Martin Kemp, David Ginola and Johnny Vegas.
Wheeler Dealers On the Road Discovery Real Time – Twelve-parter in which presenters Mike and Edd travel around Europe to buy and restore classic cars.
Fiona's Story August 2008, BBC1 – Drama about a family torn apart when the husband is accused of downloading child pornography. Stars Gina McKee and Jeremy Northam as Fiona and Simon Mortimer with Jimi Mistry, Claire Bloom, Nicholas Farrell and Amanda Root. Written by Kate Gabriel.
CIA Experiments: The Secret History Wednesday 3 September 2008, National Geographic
Gardeners' World BBC2 – Toby Buckland becomes the main presenter, replacing Monty Don.
Crimewatch Roadshow BBC1 – A four-week series of live programmes from across the UK fronted by Rav Wilding.
Martin Clunes: One Man And His Dogs Sunday 24 August 2008, ITV1 – The actor travels the world to find the ancestors of Britain's pets and explores why they have worked so well with humans.
Pierrepoint Monday 25 August 2008, ITV1 – A TV showing of the film made by ITV starring Timothy Spall as 1930s hangman Albert Pierrepoint. With Mary Stockley as Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in Britain, Juliet Stevenson as Albert's wife Anne Fletcher and Eddie Marsan as his pal Tish.
The Last Word Monday 25 August 2008, BBC1 – Three 30-minute comedy dramas written, produced and directed by Hugo Blick. Six Days One June stars Rhys Ifans as a man with a dominating mother; Before I Call You In stars Sheila Hancock as a dying woman; and A Bit Of Private Business stars Bob Hoskins as an assassin. Made by Baby Cow.
Mutual Friends Tuesday 26 August 2008, BBC1 – Six-part comedy drama series about solicitor Martin Grantham (Marc Warren), who is happily married to Jen (Keeley Hawes), with a son Dan, but his life is changed when best friend Carl throws himself under a train. The cast also includes Alexander Armstrong as Martin's immature, unwanted, friend Patrick, Sarah Alexander, Claire Rushbrook, Naomi Bentley, Rhashan Stone, Lee Ross and Emily Joyce. Written by Richard Pinto and Anil Gupta (whose credits include The Kumars At No 42, Goodness, Gracious Me); made by Hat Trick.
Fiddles, Cheats and Scams Tuesday 26 August 2008, ITV1 – Three-parter in which Morland Sanders follows investigators who work to stop people cheating the insurance industry
Don't Tell the Bride Tuesday 26 August 2008, BBC3 – Series in which grooms get to choose every detail of his upcoming wedding.
My Zinc Bed Wednesday 27 August 2008, BBC2 – Drama based on David Hare stageplay about penniless but gifted poet Paul Peplow (Paddy Considine), a recovering alcoholic who is sent to interview wealthy internet entrepreneur Victor Quinn (Jonathan Pryce), whose wife Elsa (Uma Thurman) is a recovering alcoholic.
Accidental Heroes Thursday 28 August 2008, BBC1 – Six-part series featuring stories of people who have narrowly escaped death.
Terry Wogan's Total Recall Monday 25 August 2008, Channel 4 – Game show fronted by the veteran broadcaster in which three contestants will have to remember answers from previous rounds to win the cash prize.
Come Dine With Me Monday 25 August 2008, Channel 4 – Returns of the series in which amateur chefs compete to be the best dinner party host.
Friday, 15 August 2008
How Not to Live Your Life, BBC3
Did we like it?
Don Danbury is an idiot. Not a loveable idiot – an annoying idiot. And his dead grandmother has left him a huge house in her will. Unfortunately for Don, there’s a load left to pay on the mortgage and his grandmother’s carer seems be a permanent fixture. Written by and starring Dan Clark as Don, this was a real hit and miss effort - with laugh out loud lines interspersed with behaviour by Don that left you wishing someone would give him a bloody good hammering. We’ll probably give it a second chance.
What was good about it?
• Like all the great comedy characters (think David Brent), Don has absolutely no self-awareness and just doesn’t realise how much people despise him – not even when everyone reminds him of how his Gran used to call him “Dickhead”.
• The conceit of title cards, “5 things you shouldn’t say after a one night stand”, "5 things Don wanted to do to …” lead to some great lines in various imagined scenarios, but the idea has been done quite a few times before.
• Don’s imagined responses to being sacked, such as smacking his boss round the head with a keyboard, or pissing on her desk, made us chuckle.
• Don’s note after leaving his one night stand asleep: “Dear … Had to rush off. Sorry. X The sex was good. Two ticks (one crossed out)
• Don’s ad for a housemate in the local paper: “Large room with authentic 70’s décor. Perfect for sexy chick who isn’t needy.”
• And after the obligatory gallery of grotesques fail the interview process, a sexy chick does indeed turn up: Abbie Jones, an old schoolmate of Don’s whom he used to have a huge crush on. Unfortunately, she’s got a boyfriend in tow…
• There was a great scene where Don is shagging his ex-boss – twisting her into all sorts of positions, whilst pleading to be reinstated. We could see the punchline a mile away (but it was still funny) as her orgasmic “Yesss!” coincides with Don’s 20th pitiful, “Can I have my job back?”
What was bad about it?
• Dan Clark’s gurning meant that Don’s character got on our nerves very quickly, as did his the overdone voiceover. Maybe somebody else should have played the role.
• It was stretching plot credibility just too far that Abby would have entertained living in such an awful house with such an annoying character.
Thursday, 14 August 2008
Lost Land of the Jaguar, BBC1
Did we like it?
Moments of astounding natural beauty punctuated by moments of outstanding manufactured vexation.
What was good about it?
• The rain forests of Guyana are such a naturally beautiful landscape that you could simply have propped a camera almost anywhere in the verdant undergrowth and popped back a month later with enough celluloid miracles to fill three hours of TV (and, at some points we might have preferred this to have been the case).
• In those rare instances when the team shut their mouths and let us watch the wildlife they’d admirably found unobstructed there were some magical sights.
• The teeming fish leaping back up the river in an apparent forlorn quest to return to their breeding grounds. The team helpfully scooped up armfuls of the fish to show us that they were indeed fish and were leaping, which was invaluable.
• Dr George took a break from cracking his bullwhip over the skulls of nefarious Nazis to explain how ants have evolved to ‘ride’ leaves carried by their larger siblings to fend off flies who want to lay eggs in the siblings’ heads. Unfortunately, more time was spent on the scientific first of watching men carry a boat across land to an adjacent tributary.
• When Gordon and George finally make it to their destination, we were able to enjoy the fearless giant otters and nonchalant capybara. While Justine captured an anteater on camera as it nuzzled a termite nest.
• Steve’s sojourn atop the Venezuelan mountain was about three thousand times more interesting than the climb to get there. He spent time tracking down a mysterious mammal, probably unidentified, stroked a vividly-coloured frog and set up a light trap which attracted flocks of huge moths – this was brilliant television, and it’s just a shame there couldn’t have been more chapters like this.
• Similarly, Gordon’s race to film a rare harpy eagle was just as beguiling. Scrambling to a bank to point his camera up to its high perch, it remained largely motionless while the dismembered body of a small monkey hung limply from its talons like a child’s toy.
What was bad about it?
• When we watch scientists venture off into the unknown on an expedition to discover new species and navigate tough terrain, we anticipate the majority of the time to be consumed by the animals and plants, and close observation of their habits. We don’t expect the scientists to be portrayed as amateur Indiana Joneses, the jungle to be an autonomous entity with a rootless desire to end human life and the animals slavering fiends from Dungeons & Dragons. But this is what we mostly got.
• Our hackles were raised by the opening credits that introduced each scientist like the cast of Dallas, showing off a taste of their skills – filming in the canopy, rock climbing, complaining – which indicated this would be a character-driven documentary of the worst kind. Can’t they gather we’re not terribly interested in Steve’s rock climb, only the zoological treasure trove he found at the top of the mountain?
• And our irascibility was exacerbated further by the overblown commentary that sought to cast each slight inconvenience as a life-imperilling tragedy-in-waiting. “Every step is a step into the unknown!” to describe the climb. It’s hardly “the unknown” when you’ve got panoramic shots from a helicopter.
• While Steve still found the time to breathlessly exaggerate the danger: “If this boulder came off, I don’t want to think about what would happen.”
• Meanwhile, Gordon and George are trekking up a river, but this is no ordinary river. “Ahead of them, mile after mile of ferocious rapids”, and once the rapids have been tackled, “The wildlife of the upper reaches of the river are protected by these treacherous falls.” Now we appreciate that trekking through the Amazon is difficult, but we don’t want to listen to people bleating about it, we can see it’s quite tough from the pictures.
• And Gordon and George are further troubled when, “Their boat’s being dragged back against the current.” Naturally, it’s all hands to the pump, except the cameraman who captures the incident to prop up the drama. And if we want to watch middle-aged men struggle up South American rivers we’ll rent out Fitzcarraldo.
• Steve, too, isn’t one to let a chance to ruin a view with his own commentary go begging. “The view is extraordinary, wisps of clouds below,” he exclaimed, describing an extraordinary view of the jungle, with a few wisps of clouds below his perch. As an optional audio commentary for the blind it might be evocative, but for everyone else it’s superfluous.
• Justine clambered into a cave full of vampire bats and couldn’t wait to tell us how scared she was, as if auditioning for a Discovery Channel documentary to further demonise the Great White shark. “They’re the stuff of nightmares, aren’t they?” she confided. No, they look like fascinating creatures. “Vampire bats,” she continued, reaching for a crucifix and wooden stake from her backpack, “are perfectly designed to feed on blood – razor sharp teeth pierce the skin and two channels under the tongue help draw it up.” We’d rather have learnt more about their echo-location hunting technique.
• But Gordon and George weren’t to be outdone. They spotted a huge anaconda on the riverbank. Gordon sized up the chances of a lethal encounter, recalling with relish that a smaller anaconda had once “eat a whole pig”. We just can’t fathom why such a professional team took such a juvenile approach to beautiful wildlife, focusing on their threat to humans, real or imagined.
• While we appreciate that each David Attenborough opus is filmed over a duration of about six years for six hours of programming, there was far too much team-centric filler that diluted the impact of the real attraction – the wildlife.
• “Guyana, South America,” confided the tarnished narration. If a viewer doesn’t know where Guyana is then they should be forced to go and look it up on a map.
• Useless similes and metaphors. “Steve’s having to raise his game to keep up with his world class [climbing] team.” ‘World class’ is meaningless even when used in its most common haunt of inebriated football disputes, and is even more inane when applied to climbers. How about “excellent team” or “superb team”, what’s wrong with these adjectives?
• And: “Ahead of them, a climb the height of Canary Wharf.” We don’t all live in London and therefore have no idea how tall Canary Wharf is. Why not state the height in metres and then let us imagine something we’re familiar with that’s approximately the same height, or choose a more significant landmark?
Moments of astounding natural beauty punctuated by moments of outstanding manufactured vexation.
What was good about it?
• The rain forests of Guyana are such a naturally beautiful landscape that you could simply have propped a camera almost anywhere in the verdant undergrowth and popped back a month later with enough celluloid miracles to fill three hours of TV (and, at some points we might have preferred this to have been the case).
• In those rare instances when the team shut their mouths and let us watch the wildlife they’d admirably found unobstructed there were some magical sights.
• The teeming fish leaping back up the river in an apparent forlorn quest to return to their breeding grounds. The team helpfully scooped up armfuls of the fish to show us that they were indeed fish and were leaping, which was invaluable.
• Dr George took a break from cracking his bullwhip over the skulls of nefarious Nazis to explain how ants have evolved to ‘ride’ leaves carried by their larger siblings to fend off flies who want to lay eggs in the siblings’ heads. Unfortunately, more time was spent on the scientific first of watching men carry a boat across land to an adjacent tributary.
• When Gordon and George finally make it to their destination, we were able to enjoy the fearless giant otters and nonchalant capybara. While Justine captured an anteater on camera as it nuzzled a termite nest.
• Steve’s sojourn atop the Venezuelan mountain was about three thousand times more interesting than the climb to get there. He spent time tracking down a mysterious mammal, probably unidentified, stroked a vividly-coloured frog and set up a light trap which attracted flocks of huge moths – this was brilliant television, and it’s just a shame there couldn’t have been more chapters like this.
• Similarly, Gordon’s race to film a rare harpy eagle was just as beguiling. Scrambling to a bank to point his camera up to its high perch, it remained largely motionless while the dismembered body of a small monkey hung limply from its talons like a child’s toy.
What was bad about it?
• When we watch scientists venture off into the unknown on an expedition to discover new species and navigate tough terrain, we anticipate the majority of the time to be consumed by the animals and plants, and close observation of their habits. We don’t expect the scientists to be portrayed as amateur Indiana Joneses, the jungle to be an autonomous entity with a rootless desire to end human life and the animals slavering fiends from Dungeons & Dragons. But this is what we mostly got.
• Our hackles were raised by the opening credits that introduced each scientist like the cast of Dallas, showing off a taste of their skills – filming in the canopy, rock climbing, complaining – which indicated this would be a character-driven documentary of the worst kind. Can’t they gather we’re not terribly interested in Steve’s rock climb, only the zoological treasure trove he found at the top of the mountain?
• And our irascibility was exacerbated further by the overblown commentary that sought to cast each slight inconvenience as a life-imperilling tragedy-in-waiting. “Every step is a step into the unknown!” to describe the climb. It’s hardly “the unknown” when you’ve got panoramic shots from a helicopter.
• While Steve still found the time to breathlessly exaggerate the danger: “If this boulder came off, I don’t want to think about what would happen.”
• Meanwhile, Gordon and George are trekking up a river, but this is no ordinary river. “Ahead of them, mile after mile of ferocious rapids”, and once the rapids have been tackled, “The wildlife of the upper reaches of the river are protected by these treacherous falls.” Now we appreciate that trekking through the Amazon is difficult, but we don’t want to listen to people bleating about it, we can see it’s quite tough from the pictures.
• And Gordon and George are further troubled when, “Their boat’s being dragged back against the current.” Naturally, it’s all hands to the pump, except the cameraman who captures the incident to prop up the drama. And if we want to watch middle-aged men struggle up South American rivers we’ll rent out Fitzcarraldo.
• Steve, too, isn’t one to let a chance to ruin a view with his own commentary go begging. “The view is extraordinary, wisps of clouds below,” he exclaimed, describing an extraordinary view of the jungle, with a few wisps of clouds below his perch. As an optional audio commentary for the blind it might be evocative, but for everyone else it’s superfluous.
• Justine clambered into a cave full of vampire bats and couldn’t wait to tell us how scared she was, as if auditioning for a Discovery Channel documentary to further demonise the Great White shark. “They’re the stuff of nightmares, aren’t they?” she confided. No, they look like fascinating creatures. “Vampire bats,” she continued, reaching for a crucifix and wooden stake from her backpack, “are perfectly designed to feed on blood – razor sharp teeth pierce the skin and two channels under the tongue help draw it up.” We’d rather have learnt more about their echo-location hunting technique.
• But Gordon and George weren’t to be outdone. They spotted a huge anaconda on the riverbank. Gordon sized up the chances of a lethal encounter, recalling with relish that a smaller anaconda had once “eat a whole pig”. We just can’t fathom why such a professional team took such a juvenile approach to beautiful wildlife, focusing on their threat to humans, real or imagined.
• While we appreciate that each David Attenborough opus is filmed over a duration of about six years for six hours of programming, there was far too much team-centric filler that diluted the impact of the real attraction – the wildlife.
• “Guyana, South America,” confided the tarnished narration. If a viewer doesn’t know where Guyana is then they should be forced to go and look it up on a map.
• Useless similes and metaphors. “Steve’s having to raise his game to keep up with his world class [climbing] team.” ‘World class’ is meaningless even when used in its most common haunt of inebriated football disputes, and is even more inane when applied to climbers. How about “excellent team” or “superb team”, what’s wrong with these adjectives?
• And: “Ahead of them, a climb the height of Canary Wharf.” We don’t all live in London and therefore have no idea how tall Canary Wharf is. Why not state the height in metres and then let us imagine something we’re familiar with that’s approximately the same height, or choose a more significant landmark?
The TV Week – what's new 23-29 August
Takin' over the Asylum, BBC4, Saturday8.00pm Marx Brothers: Time Marxes On Sky Arts
8.30pm Who Wants To Be a Millionaire? Celebrity Special ITV1 – Featuring Michelle Collins and Sean Gallagher, and Johnny Vaughan and Denise Van Outen.
9.00pm Reading and Leeds Festival BBC3 – Featuring Editors, the Raconteurs, The Killers and the Manic Street Preachers.
9.00pm Justin Timberlake Biography9.30pm Outnumbered BBC4 – Rerun of the family sitcom starring Claire Skinner, Hugh Dennis and Samantha Bond.
10.00pm Takin' over the Asylum BBC4 – Beginning a rerun of the classic drama starring Ken Stott as Eddie McKenna who sets up a radio station at St Jude's Mental Hospital. With David Tennant, Elizabeth Spriggs, Roy Hanlon, Mary MacLeod and Katy Murphy.
Sunday
4.40pm KylieX2008 Channel 4 – Kylie Minogue in concert at London's O2 Arena.
7.00pm, 11.05pm Reading and Leeds Festival BBC3 – Featuring Feeder, Slipknot, Metallica and the Last Shadow Puppets7.30pm BBC Proms: St John's Passion BBC4
9.00pm Martin Clunes: One Man And His Dogs ITV1 – The actor travels the world to find the ancestors of Britain's pets and explores why they have worked so well with humans.
g Guest list
• Joan Rivers, Matthew Bourne The Edinburgh Festival Show, BBC2, Tuesday
• The Charlotte Church Show Channel 4, Thursday
• Kelly Rowland, The Script, Courteeners and Twisted Wheel on Transmission, Channel 4, Friday.
Monday
9.00am Helicopter Heroes BBC1 – Ten-part series presented by Rav Wilding following the Yorkshire Air Ambulance.5.00pm Terry Wogan's Total Recall Channel 4 – Game show fronted by the veteran broadcaster in which three contestants will have to remember answers from previous rounds to win the cash prize.
5.30pm Come Dine With Me Channel 4 – Returns of the series in which amateur chefs compete to be the best dinner party host.
6.30pm Edinburgh Military Tattoo 2008 BBC1
6.30pm MasterChef – The Professionals BBC2 – Daily series in which chefs battle to reach professional standard, judged by Gregg Wallace and Michelin star chef Michel Roux Jnr.7.30pm BBC Proms: Prokofiev and Tchaikovsky BBC4
9.00pm Pierrepoint ITV1 – A TV showing of the film made by ITV starring Timothy Spall as 1930s hangman Albert Pierrepoint. With Mary Stockley as Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in Britain, Juliet Stevenson as Albert's wife Anne Fletcher and Eddie Marsan as his pal Tish.
9.00pm Profiling Val McDermid ITV3 – Documentary about the controversial crime writer, accompanied by reruns of Wire in the Blood.
10.35pm The Last Word BBC1 – Three 30-minute comedy dramas written, produced and directed by Hugo Blick. Begins with Six Days One June stars Rhys Ifans as a man with a dominating mother; followed by Before I Call You In (Tuesday) starring Sheila Hancock as a dying woman; and A Bit Of Private Business (Wednesday) with Bob Hoskins as an assassin. Made by Baby Cow.11.05pm Comedy Lab Channel 4 – Headwreckers starring five comics from Dublin.
Tuesday
8.00pm Thames Shipwrecks: A Race Against Time BBC2
9.00pm Mutual Friends BBC1 – Six-part comedy drama series about solicitor Martin Grantham (Marc Warren), who is happily married to Jen (Keeley Hawes), with a son Dan, but his life is changed when best friend Carl throws himself under a train. The cast also includes Alexander Armstrong as Martin's immature, unwanted, friend Patrick, Sarah Alexander, Claire Rushbrook, Naomi Bentley, Rhashan Stone, Lee Ross and Emily Joyce. Written by Richard Pinto and Anil Gupta (whose credits include The Kumars At No 42, Goodness, Gracious Me); made by Hat Trick.9.00pm Fiddles, Cheats and Scams ITV1 – Three-parter in which Morland Sanders follows investigators who work to stop people cheating the insurance industry.
9.00pm Don't Tell the Bride BBC3 – Series in which grooms get to choose every detail of his upcoming wedding.11.05pm Comedy Lab Channel 4 – Mr & Mrs Fandango, a sketch show starring Barunka O'Shaughnessy and Tom Meeten.
Wednesday
9.00pm My Zinc Bed August BBC2 – Drama based on David Hare stageplay about penniless but gifted poet Paul Peplow (Paddy Considine), a recovering alcoholic who is sent to interview wealthy internet entrepreneur Victor Quinn (Jonathan Pryce), whose wife Elsa (Uma Thurman) is a recovering alcoholic.
10.00pm Alan Carr: Tooth Fairy Live Channel 4
10.50pm Comedy Lab Channel 4 – Olivia Lee's Naughty Bits.
10.50pm Comedy Lab Channel 4 – A sketch show/sitcom, Pappy's Fun Club, starring Matthew Crosby, Brendan Dodds, Ben Clark and Tomas Parry.
Thursday8.30pm Accidental Heroes BBC1 – Six-part series featuring stories of people who have narrowly escaped death.
9.00pm Fame Junkies BBC3 – London barman Garron Mitchell embarks on an experiment to infiltrate the 'celebrity machine'.
10.30pm The Wrong Door BBC3 – Six-part comedy sketch show set in a parallel universe, where the special effects seen in the movies and on TV are part of everyday life. Stars Brian Blessed, Pippa Haywood, Rasmus Hardiker, Alex MacQueen, MyAnna Buring, Burt Kwouk, Miles Jupp, Ingrid Oliver, Lucy Cudden, Lorna Watson and Humphrey Ker plus guest stars including Matt Berry and Neil Fox. Characters include the Booze Fairies, the Wizard of Oswestry, the World's Most Annoying Creature and love-struck dinosaur Phillip, superheroes, wizards, dinosaurs and monsters.
Friday
8.00pm Most Haunted Live: Total Darkness LivingTV – Yvette Fielding and the team spend three nights investigating London's underground spooky spots.
9.30pm Cambridge Folk Festival 2008 BBC4 – Featuring Seth Lakeman, Noah And The Whale, Martha Wainwright and The Imagined Village.
10.00pm All New TV's Naughtiest Blunders ITV1
10.00pm Ronaldo - Red Devil ITV4 – Profile of the Manchester United footballer.
11.00pm Reading and Leeds Festival 2008 BBC2
g Subject list
• The G-Spot Superbotox Me. Channel 4, Sunday
• Britain From Above Untamed Britain. BBC1, Sunday
* Despatches How The Banks Never Lose. Channel 4, Monday
• Panorama Britishness. BBC1, Monday
• Revealed JFK - The Scandals. Five, Tuesday
• Drama Trails Footballers' Wives to Brideshead Revisited. ITV3, Wednesday
• Who Do You Think You Are? Jerry Springer BBC1, Wednesday
• First Cut A1: The Road Musical. Channel 4, Friday
• Comedy Connections Dad's Army BBC1, Friday
Kevin McCloud and the Big Town Plan, Channel 4
Did we like it?Urban planning and modern housing is becoming a larger issue in the UK with designers and architects seeking to find ways of improving living conditions and society in general. This experiment in Castleford backed by C4 should be an interesting series and this wasn't a bad start.
What was good about it?
• The troupe of architects that came to visit Castleford swarmed around the town like fascinated scientists exploring virgin rainforest. We thought they might want to take samples of Castlefordians home to study in their labs.
• The first project was to build a new footbridge over the River Aire, linking Duck Island to the town and hopefully leading to a regenerated riverside area in the future. Great idea, and it was interesting to see the early wranglings between the two female local campaigners and the council. The locals demanded a complicated 'floating bridge' design, while the council wanted the more practical (and arguably more attractive), curved high bridge. The locals won out – and that's where the problems started.
• The finished bridge was quite fantastic, a beautiful S shape that swirls across the Aire like a serpent, allowing people to enjoy the torrents of water below (especially now the Environment Agency has cleaned it up).
• It could be that rare thing – a TV show that makes a genuine difference. If things succeed in Castleford, perhaps more towns will follow and make a mockery of the idea published this week that the North is dying.
What was bad about it?
• There was little wrong with the actual programme (as long as you can bear Kevin McCloud's earnest, lofty presentation methods – and opinion is divided at thecustard on that issue) but plenty was wrong with the project itself.
• The winning design by Renato Benedetti, an architect who had never built a bridge before, was a floating bridge that had never been tested before, let alone on an unpredictable river like the Aire. Yet the local champions managed to bully it past the helpless councillors who were perhaps cowed by the TV cameras, eager to be seen to be listening to constituents.
• Yet eight months later nothing had been done • not even any surveying of the river and the surrounding areas. There were huge problems over land ownership, not to mention the safety of a floating bridge. So, getting on for a year later, Benedetti designed a much better looking bridge for much more money. In total it took about 5 years to get the thing built, a fairly ridiculous amount of time. There wasn't much time in the programme to go in depth into all the delays, but while early on everyone agreed that a bridge was a good idea, no one seemed to have done any groundwork or feasibility studies.
• As a result, the cost rose from an initial mooted figure by Benedetti of £120,000 (he even mentioned half that figure at one point) to a figure quoted by McCloud in the programme of £3.2m. An online search suggested that figure was closer to £4.8m. Astonishing money for a town of less than 40,000 people.
• These gigantic figures made McCloud's early trumpeting of C4's 'brave' commitment of £100k towards the entire project look like a trifle. Which, if you know anything about TV budgets, it is, really.
• McCloud claiming total success at the end, offering the bridge as evidence that architecture can change towns and people. Except the bridge was opened only last month. It's just slightly early to be making such grand statements, despite the undeniable beauty of the bridge.
Wednesday, 13 August 2008
Maestro, BBC2
Did we like it?
Initially it was like gazing hopelessly into an impenetrable fog with a sporadic glimpse of shining cufflinks, pompous miens, quivering cellos and, as this is a reality show, the odd tear. But gradually we became more indoctrinated into the twilight world of classical music. Bravo!
What was good about it?
• Unlike most reality shows, so far Maestro is an unassuming exhibition that seeks to educate you about the intricacies and skills of conducting an orchestra rather than inflicting a series of ‘tiresome’ journeys on us. A caveat to this praise, however, is that the show goes ‘live’ from next week, but will hopefully avoid the disfiguring plague that afflicts X-Factor and Last Choir Standing in similar environments. Bravo!
• At first, the whole process of conducting an orchestra was utterly bewildering. Even in the initial lessons each student heeded, we still didn’t have a clue what was going on. However, once the mentors to the students arrived, the little details became more apparent. We learned how the ostensibly random arm waving affects the peaks and troughs of the orchestra, heightening crescendos or clipping some meandering strings as well as tapping out the all important rhythm. Bravo!
• This was most obvious when the students conducted the orchestra in order to qualify for the next programme. Bradley Walsh led the orchestra for Dance of the Night (AKA The Apprentice theme tune), and wasn’t bad but he was followed by Peter Snow. And what a moment that was. Bravo!
• Whereas Walsh had managed to conduct a recognisable and coherent performance, Snow’s incompetent baton waving resulted in a rendition that crumbled so rapidly it could have soundtracked Georgia being squashed under the imperialistic jackboot of Russia. In the audience, Snow’s mentor couldn’t watch while those beside him giggled and some members of the orchestra simply stopped playing so bamboozled were they by his aimless windmills. Bravo!
• He was so bad that it begs the question why his musically superior cousin Jon Snow was not chosen to take part – we can only think it was either that it would have meant too many ‘foreign’ newsreaders, along with ITV’s Katie Derham, or that Snow was the X-Factor first round acts, chosen purely for their appalling absence of talent. Bravo!
• The remainder of the aspiring conductors were thankfully bereft of reality TV parasites. Bradley Walsh’s main accomplishment was to charitably sweat copiously; Katie Derham was quite good but was deliciously told that her inherent jauntiness and a perma-grin were of no use to her in this arena; David Soul was endearing and bumbling; Jane Asher was elegant and talented; and Sue Perkins was a bit rigid caused by her schooling in the piano as a child. Bravo!
• The two musicians were Alex James and Goldie. James didn’t start with much of an advantage over his peers as he fulfilled the Andrew Ridgeley role in Blur; he now has a paunch and his black locks resemble Jimmy White’s hair transplant. Bravo!
• Goldie was the best of the bunch. He has very little of the po-faced repression of the classical music elite, and this was picked up on by the judges. But he overcame this with an intuitive understanding of the music he was conveying to the orchestra, acting to the true meaning of the word conductor in that he was visibly communicating all the passion and emotion from the music into his epileptic twirling, which audibly improved the performance of the orchestra. Bravo!
• The best music in amid all the classic classical tunes was the piece that accompanied Alex and Peter being hooked out of the audience as they scored lowest, and their fate was then decided by the orchestra and their keypads. It was the taut anthem to the climax of 28 Days Later that itself aped the superior East Hastings by Godspeed You! Black Emperor from earlier on in the film. Bravo!
What was bad about it?
• The four pieces of music picked for the eight students to share – Dance of the Night; Bizet’s Carmen; Grieg’s In The Hall of the Mountain King; and The Blue Danube by Strauss – were the kind of populist classical tunes that aficionados of the genre would sneer at in the same way that we might sneer at X-Factor contestants performing Angels, You Raise Me Up, Beautiful and the rest of the rancid refuse you’ll see further mutilated this Saturday.
• And while on first, and probably second, listen the anthems were still rousing, by the eighth or ninth listen they’d begun to pall, and were really quite dull.
• The judges mostly offer expert comment without the usual froth after some producer-type has told them to embellish their words, but Zoe did say, “They’re being taken out of their comfort zones”. ‘Comfort zones’ don’t exist in the real world, only in the world of television.
• Katie Derham isn’t half as annoying as you might imagine (although we can't abide the way she simpers alongside the world's smuggest creep, Alastair Stewart on the news), but she did berate the orchestra (“Come on! Come on!”) as though they were a nervous pony that had already twice refused to jump a fence at the Badminton Horse Trials.
• Watching, it was almost impossible to judge how good or bad each of the students were in their final performance (except Peter Snow). This meant a slight sense of estrangement from proceedings as you had to scrutinise the faces of the mentors and judges for signs of good or ill rather than focus on the performance itself to make your own rudimentary assessment.
Old Post,2008
Frock Me Channel 4 – Seven-part fashion and music entertainment series for T4 presented by Alexa Chung and fashion designer Henry Holland.
For One Night Only autumn 2008, ITV1 – Saturday night variety show featuring top music and comedy stars plus speciality acts. Each show will be hosted by two stars, with all of the guests gathering for a showpiece finale.
We Are Not Amused autumn 2008, ITV1 – One-off comedy show starring the best comedians of the past 60 years to mark Prince Charles' 60th birthday and raise funds for his Prince's Trust charity.
Divas 2 autumn 2008, ITV1 – A second special featuring female singers.
Everybody Dance Now autumn 2008, ITV1 – Saturday night show featuring dance crazes that took Britain by storm.
Three Dogs spring 2009, BBC2 – Series in which BBC world affairs editor John Simpson teaches adventurers Ranulph Fiennes and Robin Knox-Johnston how to file news reports from a warzone.
Undercover Coach Disney Channel – Five-part series following British sports stars mentoring young athlete. Features tennis star Jamie Murray, England rugby player James Haskell, England footballer Kelly Smith, England cricketer Geraint Jones and golfer Ian Pouter.
The Colour of Money ITV1 – Game show in which contestants try to win money from 20 different coloured cash machines.
Nativity BBC – Comedy film about rival nativity plays starring Martin Freeman as Mr Maddens, a frustrated primary school teacher and Ashley Jensen as his ex-girlfriend, Jennifer Lore, a major Hollywood producer.
It's Never Too Late... BBC4 – Documentary following actress Liz Smith on her first overseas holiday, a luxury cruise.
Fringe Sky1 – US science fiction drama about an international flight that lands in Boston with all its passengers and crew dead. Created by Lost creator JJ Abrams and Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman, who worked with him on the forthcoming Star Trek film. Stars Joshua Jackson, John Noble and Lance Reddick.
Eggheads BBC2 – Jeremy Vine will share the role of host with Dermot Murnaghan on the general knowledge quiz
Are You An Egghead? BBC2 – A spin-off from the teatime quix in which members of the public will compete to join the resident champions,
Wired ITV1 – Three-part thriller about bank fraud, starring Jodie Whittaker as single mum Louise who works for a bank and is forced into helping cream off £250m. With Toby Stephens as mysterious police officer Crawford, Laurence Fox as Louise’s devious boyfriend Philip, Charlie Brooks as Louise's best friend Anna plus Riz Ahmed, Sacha Dhawan and Ramon Tikarum). Written by Kate Brooke.
A Place of Execution ITV1 – Three-part drama based on Val McDermid’s bestselling novel about a missing 13-year-old girl, switching between the past and the present. Stars Juliet Stevenson as TV reporter Catherine Heathcote, who is making a film based on the 1963 disappearance of schoolgirl, Alison Carter (Poppy Goodburn), with Lee Ingleby and Philip Jackson as DI George Bennett, Emma Cunniffe as Alison’s mother Ruth, Greg Wise as Alison's stepfather Hawkin, Elizabeth Day as Catherine's 14-year-old daughter Sasha, plus Tony Maudsley, Sheila Reid, Dave Hill, Peter Cartwright, Nicholas Pritchard and Joy Blakeman.
Lost In Austen autumn 2008, ITV1 – Four-part drama series starring Jemima Rooper as Amanda, who lives in a rented flat in London with boyfriend Michael and is obsessed with author Jane Austen. Amanda ends up in the 19th-century world of Pride & Prejudice, swapping places with fictional character Elizabeth Bennet. With Gemma Arterton as Elizabeth Bennet, Hugh Bonneville and Alex Kingston as Mr and Mrs Bennet, Lindsay Duncan as Darcy's aunt, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, Morven Christie as Jane Bennet, Tom Mison as Mr Bingley, Guy Henry as Mr Collins, Tom Riley as Captain Wickham and Christina Cole as Caroline Bingley. Written by Guy Andrews (credits include Chancer, Prime Suspect and Lewis); made by Mammoth Screen.
Pierrepoint autumn ITV1 – A TV showing of the film made by ITV starring Timothy Spall as 1930s hangman Albert Pierrepoint. With Mary Stockley as Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in Britain, Juliet Stevenson as Albert's wife Anne Fletcher and Eddie Marsan as his pal Tish.
The Children autumn 2008, ITV1 – Three-part thriller following the investigation into the murder of eight-year-old Emily (Sinead Michael), written by Lucy Gannon. Stars Kevin Whately as Cameron, Lesley Sharp as his ex-wife Anne, Geraldine Somerville as his new girlfriend Sue, Ian Puleston-Davies as Sue’s ex-husband Paul and Kate Ashfield as his new partner Natasha,
Caught in a Trap autumn 2008, ITV1 – Drama starring Connie Fisher, the winner of How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria, as Gemma Perkins, a woman obsessed with Elvis Presley, who goes on a spending spree buying Elvis memorabilia after coming into some money. With Jim Carter as Gemma's father, Geraldine James as her stepmother and Joe Absolom as her love interest. Written by James Graham
Above Suspicion autumn 2008, ITV1 – Two-part drama adapted by Lynda la Plante from her own novel, starring Kelly Reilly as DC Anna Travis, an ambitious police officer who is following in her late father's footsteps and is assigned to her first murder case, and Ciaran Hinds as her volatile boss, DCI Langton.
Mr Eleven autumn 2008, ITV1 – – Two-part romantic comedy starring Michelle Ryan as Saz Paley, a teacher who is obsessed with marrying her 11th sexual partner. With Sean Maguire as hunky doctor Dan, Adam Garcia as handsome Australian Alex, Lynda Bellingham, Olivia Coleman, Denis Lawson, Nicholas Burns and Preeya Kalidas. Written by Amanda Coe.
The Commander autumn 2008, ITV1 – A fifth, three-part, series of Lynda Le Plante's police drama starring Amanda Burton as Commander Clare Blake with Mark Lewis Jones as DCI Doug James and Paul Brightwell as Brian Hall. Guest stars include Crissy Rock and Jennifer Ellison.
Poirot autumn 2008, ITV1 – Series of four new films starring David Suchet as Agatha Christie's Belgian detective. Guest stars include Zoë Wanamaker, Joe Absolom, Richard Hope, Sarah Smart, Lesley Nicol, Ruth Gemmell, Raquel Cassidy, Simon Shepherd, Sian Phillips, Amanda Root, Harriet Walter, Natasha Little, Susan Woolridge, Claire Skinner, Pippa Haywood, Jo Woodcock, Clemency Burton-Hill, Matilda Sturridge, Jemima Rooper, Peter Bowles, James Wilby and Haydn Gwynne.
Wire in the Blood autumn 2008, ITV1 – Return of the crime drama, in four two-part stories, starring Robson Green as clinical psychologist Dr Tony Hill and Simone Lahbib as DI Alex Fielding. Guest stars include Christian Solimeno, John Hopkins, Mary Tamm and Michael Smiley.
A Touch Of Frost autumn 2008, ITV1 – Three new episodes starring David Jason as DI Jack Frost and Cherie Lunghi as DS marsh. Guest stars include Adrian Lukis, Keith Barron, Bruce Alexander, Elizabeth Berrington, John Castle, Nicholas Farrell, John Lyons, Mel Martin, Sarah Matravers, Paul Shane, Julia Watson, Paula Wilcox and Tam Williams.
Sharpe's Peril autumn 2008, ITV1 – Two-part drama featuring the return of Sean Bean as the swashbuckling 19th-century hero Richard Sharpe. Written by Russell Lewis. Guest stars include Raza Jaffrey, Luke Ward Wilkinson, Beatrice Rosen and Michael Cochrane.
Britannia High autumn 2008, ITV1 – Series combining two 60-minute documentaries, and eight-part stage school drama and a live 90-minute performance. Take That's Gary Barlow heads a team of songwriters who will write for the pupils of a fictional arts school, while Strictly Come Dancing's Arlene Phillips is the head of choreography, and Grease is the Word judge David Ian will help select the performers. Stars Mitch Hewer, Georgina Hagen, Sapphire Elia, Marcquelle Ward, Matthew James Thomas and Rana Roy, Mark Benton as principal Nugent, Michele Austin as eccentric landlady Mrs Troy, Lorraine Pilkington as music mentor Anna and Chris Jarvis as dance mentor Jason.
Harry Hill’s TV Burp autumn 2008, ITV1 – An eighth series of the award-winning comedy show.
National Television Awards autumn 2008, ITV1 – Hosted by Sir Trevor McDonald live at London’s Royal Albert Hall.
Pride of Britain Awards 2008 autumn 2008, ITV1 – Hosted by Carol Vorderman.
Al Murray's Happy Hour autumn 2008, ITV1 – A third series of the entertainment show.
All Star Family Fortunes autumn 2008, ITV1 – A third series of the game show hosted by Vernon Kay.
Things I Do In My Sleep autumn 2008, ITV1 – Documentary featuring people whose extreme sleep activity is ruining their lives .
Total Emergency autumn 2008, ITV1 – Series following all three major emergency services in Sheffield.
Faith In The Frame autumn 2008, ITV1 – Ten-part series in which Melvyn Bragg examines Western art's religious pictures with panellists including Ekow Eshun, Andrew Graham-Dixon, Sarah Dunant and Rowan Williams.
The South Bank Show autumn 2008, ITV1 – The arts series returns with films about the band The Streets, headed by the Mike Skinner, Ronnie Corbett, film-maker and photographer Sam Taylor-Wood, James Bond, Brazilian artist Cildo Meireles and St Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theatre.
Cops With Cameras autumn 2008, ITV1 – Third series of the programme following police forces across the country.
Britain’s Best Dish autumn 2008, ITV1 – Return of the daytime cookery series.
Sixty Minute Makeover autumn 2008, ITV1 – Return of the daytime series presented by Terri Dwyer.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show Sky1 – Remake by BSkyB, MTV and Fox TV 33 years after the cult movie premiered. It will be based on the original screenplay by Jim Sharman and Richard O'Brien.
Moses Jones BBC2 – Three-part thriller about the investigation into a suspected witchcraft murder in London. Written by Joe Penhall.
For One Night Only autumn 2008, ITV1 – Saturday night variety show featuring top music and comedy stars plus speciality acts. Each show will be hosted by two stars, with all of the guests gathering for a showpiece finale.
We Are Not Amused autumn 2008, ITV1 – One-off comedy show starring the best comedians of the past 60 years to mark Prince Charles' 60th birthday and raise funds for his Prince's Trust charity.
Divas 2 autumn 2008, ITV1 – A second special featuring female singers.
Everybody Dance Now autumn 2008, ITV1 – Saturday night show featuring dance crazes that took Britain by storm.
Three Dogs spring 2009, BBC2 – Series in which BBC world affairs editor John Simpson teaches adventurers Ranulph Fiennes and Robin Knox-Johnston how to file news reports from a warzone.
Undercover Coach Disney Channel – Five-part series following British sports stars mentoring young athlete. Features tennis star Jamie Murray, England rugby player James Haskell, England footballer Kelly Smith, England cricketer Geraint Jones and golfer Ian Pouter.
The Colour of Money ITV1 – Game show in which contestants try to win money from 20 different coloured cash machines.
Nativity BBC – Comedy film about rival nativity plays starring Martin Freeman as Mr Maddens, a frustrated primary school teacher and Ashley Jensen as his ex-girlfriend, Jennifer Lore, a major Hollywood producer.
It's Never Too Late... BBC4 – Documentary following actress Liz Smith on her first overseas holiday, a luxury cruise.
Fringe Sky1 – US science fiction drama about an international flight that lands in Boston with all its passengers and crew dead. Created by Lost creator JJ Abrams and Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman, who worked with him on the forthcoming Star Trek film. Stars Joshua Jackson, John Noble and Lance Reddick.
Eggheads BBC2 – Jeremy Vine will share the role of host with Dermot Murnaghan on the general knowledge quiz
Are You An Egghead? BBC2 – A spin-off from the teatime quix in which members of the public will compete to join the resident champions,
Wired ITV1 – Three-part thriller about bank fraud, starring Jodie Whittaker as single mum Louise who works for a bank and is forced into helping cream off £250m. With Toby Stephens as mysterious police officer Crawford, Laurence Fox as Louise’s devious boyfriend Philip, Charlie Brooks as Louise's best friend Anna plus Riz Ahmed, Sacha Dhawan and Ramon Tikarum). Written by Kate Brooke.
A Place of Execution ITV1 – Three-part drama based on Val McDermid’s bestselling novel about a missing 13-year-old girl, switching between the past and the present. Stars Juliet Stevenson as TV reporter Catherine Heathcote, who is making a film based on the 1963 disappearance of schoolgirl, Alison Carter (Poppy Goodburn), with Lee Ingleby and Philip Jackson as DI George Bennett, Emma Cunniffe as Alison’s mother Ruth, Greg Wise as Alison's stepfather Hawkin, Elizabeth Day as Catherine's 14-year-old daughter Sasha, plus Tony Maudsley, Sheila Reid, Dave Hill, Peter Cartwright, Nicholas Pritchard and Joy Blakeman.
Lost In Austen autumn 2008, ITV1 – Four-part drama series starring Jemima Rooper as Amanda, who lives in a rented flat in London with boyfriend Michael and is obsessed with author Jane Austen. Amanda ends up in the 19th-century world of Pride & Prejudice, swapping places with fictional character Elizabeth Bennet. With Gemma Arterton as Elizabeth Bennet, Hugh Bonneville and Alex Kingston as Mr and Mrs Bennet, Lindsay Duncan as Darcy's aunt, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, Morven Christie as Jane Bennet, Tom Mison as Mr Bingley, Guy Henry as Mr Collins, Tom Riley as Captain Wickham and Christina Cole as Caroline Bingley. Written by Guy Andrews (credits include Chancer, Prime Suspect and Lewis); made by Mammoth Screen.
Pierrepoint autumn ITV1 – A TV showing of the film made by ITV starring Timothy Spall as 1930s hangman Albert Pierrepoint. With Mary Stockley as Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in Britain, Juliet Stevenson as Albert's wife Anne Fletcher and Eddie Marsan as his pal Tish.
The Children autumn 2008, ITV1 – Three-part thriller following the investigation into the murder of eight-year-old Emily (Sinead Michael), written by Lucy Gannon. Stars Kevin Whately as Cameron, Lesley Sharp as his ex-wife Anne, Geraldine Somerville as his new girlfriend Sue, Ian Puleston-Davies as Sue’s ex-husband Paul and Kate Ashfield as his new partner Natasha,
Caught in a Trap autumn 2008, ITV1 – Drama starring Connie Fisher, the winner of How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria, as Gemma Perkins, a woman obsessed with Elvis Presley, who goes on a spending spree buying Elvis memorabilia after coming into some money. With Jim Carter as Gemma's father, Geraldine James as her stepmother and Joe Absolom as her love interest. Written by James Graham
Above Suspicion autumn 2008, ITV1 – Two-part drama adapted by Lynda la Plante from her own novel, starring Kelly Reilly as DC Anna Travis, an ambitious police officer who is following in her late father's footsteps and is assigned to her first murder case, and Ciaran Hinds as her volatile boss, DCI Langton.
Mr Eleven autumn 2008, ITV1 – – Two-part romantic comedy starring Michelle Ryan as Saz Paley, a teacher who is obsessed with marrying her 11th sexual partner. With Sean Maguire as hunky doctor Dan, Adam Garcia as handsome Australian Alex, Lynda Bellingham, Olivia Coleman, Denis Lawson, Nicholas Burns and Preeya Kalidas. Written by Amanda Coe.
The Commander autumn 2008, ITV1 – A fifth, three-part, series of Lynda Le Plante's police drama starring Amanda Burton as Commander Clare Blake with Mark Lewis Jones as DCI Doug James and Paul Brightwell as Brian Hall. Guest stars include Crissy Rock and Jennifer Ellison.
Poirot autumn 2008, ITV1 – Series of four new films starring David Suchet as Agatha Christie's Belgian detective. Guest stars include Zoë Wanamaker, Joe Absolom, Richard Hope, Sarah Smart, Lesley Nicol, Ruth Gemmell, Raquel Cassidy, Simon Shepherd, Sian Phillips, Amanda Root, Harriet Walter, Natasha Little, Susan Woolridge, Claire Skinner, Pippa Haywood, Jo Woodcock, Clemency Burton-Hill, Matilda Sturridge, Jemima Rooper, Peter Bowles, James Wilby and Haydn Gwynne.
Wire in the Blood autumn 2008, ITV1 – Return of the crime drama, in four two-part stories, starring Robson Green as clinical psychologist Dr Tony Hill and Simone Lahbib as DI Alex Fielding. Guest stars include Christian Solimeno, John Hopkins, Mary Tamm and Michael Smiley.
A Touch Of Frost autumn 2008, ITV1 – Three new episodes starring David Jason as DI Jack Frost and Cherie Lunghi as DS marsh. Guest stars include Adrian Lukis, Keith Barron, Bruce Alexander, Elizabeth Berrington, John Castle, Nicholas Farrell, John Lyons, Mel Martin, Sarah Matravers, Paul Shane, Julia Watson, Paula Wilcox and Tam Williams.
Sharpe's Peril autumn 2008, ITV1 – Two-part drama featuring the return of Sean Bean as the swashbuckling 19th-century hero Richard Sharpe. Written by Russell Lewis. Guest stars include Raza Jaffrey, Luke Ward Wilkinson, Beatrice Rosen and Michael Cochrane.
Britannia High autumn 2008, ITV1 – Series combining two 60-minute documentaries, and eight-part stage school drama and a live 90-minute performance. Take That's Gary Barlow heads a team of songwriters who will write for the pupils of a fictional arts school, while Strictly Come Dancing's Arlene Phillips is the head of choreography, and Grease is the Word judge David Ian will help select the performers. Stars Mitch Hewer, Georgina Hagen, Sapphire Elia, Marcquelle Ward, Matthew James Thomas and Rana Roy, Mark Benton as principal Nugent, Michele Austin as eccentric landlady Mrs Troy, Lorraine Pilkington as music mentor Anna and Chris Jarvis as dance mentor Jason.
Harry Hill’s TV Burp autumn 2008, ITV1 – An eighth series of the award-winning comedy show.
National Television Awards autumn 2008, ITV1 – Hosted by Sir Trevor McDonald live at London’s Royal Albert Hall.
Pride of Britain Awards 2008 autumn 2008, ITV1 – Hosted by Carol Vorderman.
Al Murray's Happy Hour autumn 2008, ITV1 – A third series of the entertainment show.
All Star Family Fortunes autumn 2008, ITV1 – A third series of the game show hosted by Vernon Kay.
Things I Do In My Sleep autumn 2008, ITV1 – Documentary featuring people whose extreme sleep activity is ruining their lives .
Total Emergency autumn 2008, ITV1 – Series following all three major emergency services in Sheffield.
Faith In The Frame autumn 2008, ITV1 – Ten-part series in which Melvyn Bragg examines Western art's religious pictures with panellists including Ekow Eshun, Andrew Graham-Dixon, Sarah Dunant and Rowan Williams.
The South Bank Show autumn 2008, ITV1 – The arts series returns with films about the band The Streets, headed by the Mike Skinner, Ronnie Corbett, film-maker and photographer Sam Taylor-Wood, James Bond, Brazilian artist Cildo Meireles and St Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theatre.
Cops With Cameras autumn 2008, ITV1 – Third series of the programme following police forces across the country.
Britain’s Best Dish autumn 2008, ITV1 – Return of the daytime cookery series.
Sixty Minute Makeover autumn 2008, ITV1 – Return of the daytime series presented by Terri Dwyer.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show Sky1 – Remake by BSkyB, MTV and Fox TV 33 years after the cult movie premiered. It will be based on the original screenplay by Jim Sharman and Richard O'Brien.
Moses Jones BBC2 – Three-part thriller about the investigation into a suspected witchcraft murder in London. Written by Joe Penhall.
The Genius of Charles Darwin, Channel 4
Did we like it?
Passion, intelligence, eloquence, wonder – by God we don’t always agree with the cantankerous polemics of Richard Dawkins, but he is a modern messiah for common sense over dubious myopic fantasists.
What was good about it?
• Rather than berating God-fearing church goers with promises of eternal, unconscious decay in maggot-ridden graves upon death, in this episode Dawkins took on a far trickier foe – himself, which made for absorbing, if bewildering viewing.
• Dawkins wanted to reconcile his utter devotion to the theory of Darwin that states humans are the fifth ape with the less digestible concept that because humans are nothing more than apes they are in thrall to the primal whims of natural selection, which demands that the weak and conservative are persecuted or abandoned.
• Professor Dawkins savouring the conflict with a Kenyan bishop who dared to suggest that people weren’t related to apes. As usual, Dawkins took him to the cleaners. Sometimes you wish he’d challenge an adversary with a little more stubbornness and mental guile in his religious austerity – although it’s perhaps a forlorn hope given that Dawkins is right about evolution
• Dawkins applied natural selection and its predominant “dog-eat-dog” philosophy to the corporate world. He enlightened us that such a policy was used to justify unbridled capitalism and that it is the poor’s fault that they are poor, countering that Darwin had been misrepresented to suit the selfish ideologies of extreme right wing politicians such as Hitler.
• To quell his own guilt that he may have spent his entire career advocating the antithesis of his own personal beliefs, he embarked on a voyage to discover if the more complex emotions, such as trust, sympathy and gratitude, are just part of the evolutionary process along with more primitive instincts like fear, hate and lust.
• As we shared in Professor Dawkins’ awe as he sought to discover why he felt sympathy for a stranger in distress, which contravened all laws of natural selection and both theorised forms of altruism, it seemed fairly obvious to us that humans behave in such a manner because it is simply part of the evolutionary process – that the scramble for survival seen in the animal kingdom is no longer so desperate and “dog-eat-dog”, so the next step of compassion is quite logical as strangers are often no longer “competition” for food and the basics of life.
• And, to our surprise, Professor Dawkins confirmed our layman’s theory and joyously expatiated upon it in his conclusion, stating that our genes have gone wrong and that humanity has rebelled against natural selection and “we have extracted ourselves from it”, demonstrating this through care for “the most vulnerable in our society”.
• Perhaps the most intriguing element of this documentary is watching the process of natural selection being played out before our eyes. Dawkins’ crusade – which he peppered with sensual exclamations such as “abhor” and “hate” – to tell every creationist in the world that they are wrong, hopelessly deluded and generally a blight on the human race is, in a sense, one branch of evolutionary thought seeking to crush the other branches through its imperious strength and make it as much a part of the past as the Homo Erectus skulls being exhibited in a Kenyan museum.
• Of course, his adversaries are fighting him tooth and claw through a combination of superstition and fear with the same ferocity as species have fought for the right to exist since the first single-celled amoeba came into existence billions of years ago, after an act of God sent a thunderbolt down coursing into the primordial soup to kick-start life on Earth.
What was bad about it?
• Dawkins’ rather abortive efforts to determine what women look for in a potential partner. He chatted with a number of women who assured him that kindness and other altruistic traits are just as important as the more common factors such as physical attractiveness, height and athleticism in the sperm donor catalogue they were browsing.
• Sadly, because since the advent of TV people have evolved a sense of cynicism about how they will be perceived there is a trend amongst both men and women to want to seem more profound than they actually are. The women here may genuinely require kindness in any prospective mate, but the fact they are being filmed for TV adulterates the experiment.
• Dawkins also made the rather contradictory point that, “It is only genes that survive down through the ages”. Speaking in an stoical scientific tone he’s correct, however, the whole programme is based on a seminal tome that was published almost 150 years ago and has “survived down the ages” pretty well. And Dawkins, too, will survive long after his soul has rapped nervously on the Pearly Gates, partly because of any descendants but also through his life’s work.
• The dishearteningly short advert breaks that suggest that nobody wants to show off their products to an intelligent, and presumably richer, audience and instead flog their wares during the evolutionary cultural nadir of Big Brother’s Little Brother.
Passion, intelligence, eloquence, wonder – by God we don’t always agree with the cantankerous polemics of Richard Dawkins, but he is a modern messiah for common sense over dubious myopic fantasists.
What was good about it?
• Rather than berating God-fearing church goers with promises of eternal, unconscious decay in maggot-ridden graves upon death, in this episode Dawkins took on a far trickier foe – himself, which made for absorbing, if bewildering viewing.
• Dawkins wanted to reconcile his utter devotion to the theory of Darwin that states humans are the fifth ape with the less digestible concept that because humans are nothing more than apes they are in thrall to the primal whims of natural selection, which demands that the weak and conservative are persecuted or abandoned.
• Professor Dawkins savouring the conflict with a Kenyan bishop who dared to suggest that people weren’t related to apes. As usual, Dawkins took him to the cleaners. Sometimes you wish he’d challenge an adversary with a little more stubbornness and mental guile in his religious austerity – although it’s perhaps a forlorn hope given that Dawkins is right about evolution
• Dawkins applied natural selection and its predominant “dog-eat-dog” philosophy to the corporate world. He enlightened us that such a policy was used to justify unbridled capitalism and that it is the poor’s fault that they are poor, countering that Darwin had been misrepresented to suit the selfish ideologies of extreme right wing politicians such as Hitler.
• To quell his own guilt that he may have spent his entire career advocating the antithesis of his own personal beliefs, he embarked on a voyage to discover if the more complex emotions, such as trust, sympathy and gratitude, are just part of the evolutionary process along with more primitive instincts like fear, hate and lust.
• As we shared in Professor Dawkins’ awe as he sought to discover why he felt sympathy for a stranger in distress, which contravened all laws of natural selection and both theorised forms of altruism, it seemed fairly obvious to us that humans behave in such a manner because it is simply part of the evolutionary process – that the scramble for survival seen in the animal kingdom is no longer so desperate and “dog-eat-dog”, so the next step of compassion is quite logical as strangers are often no longer “competition” for food and the basics of life.
• And, to our surprise, Professor Dawkins confirmed our layman’s theory and joyously expatiated upon it in his conclusion, stating that our genes have gone wrong and that humanity has rebelled against natural selection and “we have extracted ourselves from it”, demonstrating this through care for “the most vulnerable in our society”.
• Perhaps the most intriguing element of this documentary is watching the process of natural selection being played out before our eyes. Dawkins’ crusade – which he peppered with sensual exclamations such as “abhor” and “hate” – to tell every creationist in the world that they are wrong, hopelessly deluded and generally a blight on the human race is, in a sense, one branch of evolutionary thought seeking to crush the other branches through its imperious strength and make it as much a part of the past as the Homo Erectus skulls being exhibited in a Kenyan museum.
• Of course, his adversaries are fighting him tooth and claw through a combination of superstition and fear with the same ferocity as species have fought for the right to exist since the first single-celled amoeba came into existence billions of years ago, after an act of God sent a thunderbolt down coursing into the primordial soup to kick-start life on Earth.
What was bad about it?
• Dawkins’ rather abortive efforts to determine what women look for in a potential partner. He chatted with a number of women who assured him that kindness and other altruistic traits are just as important as the more common factors such as physical attractiveness, height and athleticism in the sperm donor catalogue they were browsing.
• Sadly, because since the advent of TV people have evolved a sense of cynicism about how they will be perceived there is a trend amongst both men and women to want to seem more profound than they actually are. The women here may genuinely require kindness in any prospective mate, but the fact they are being filmed for TV adulterates the experiment.
• Dawkins also made the rather contradictory point that, “It is only genes that survive down through the ages”. Speaking in an stoical scientific tone he’s correct, however, the whole programme is based on a seminal tome that was published almost 150 years ago and has “survived down the ages” pretty well. And Dawkins, too, will survive long after his soul has rapped nervously on the Pearly Gates, partly because of any descendants but also through his life’s work.
• The dishearteningly short advert breaks that suggest that nobody wants to show off their products to an intelligent, and presumably richer, audience and instead flog their wares during the evolutionary cultural nadir of Big Brother’s Little Brother.
Monday, 11 August 2008
Spooks: Code 9, BBC3
Did we like it?
An entertaining, unintelligent drama that so ludicrously exaggerates the potential and influence of young people on the world of politics that it makes Willy Wonka seem as rooted in reality as Life on Earth. Or perhaps we’re just old.
What was good about it?
• Evidently being the surly teenage younger brother to Spooks, Code 9 shares kindred qualities in slick action sequences, covert selfish politicians, opaque conspiracies and for the world to forever tremble on the edge of an apocalyptic abyss (although, strictly speaking, Code 9 has already suffered its apocalypse in the shape of a nuclear device that “incinerated 100,000 people” at the 2012 Olympic Games – on the bright side that means that The One Show will cease to exist).
• While a trifle hackneyed, the dramatic device of introducing a new character into an unfamiliar environment, and to drag the audience along too, works pretty well. Here it’s “geeky” mathematician – all the Code 9 squad come from disparate professions/ backgrounds seemingly chosen at random as if a modern day version of Mr Benn adventures because of the casualties MI5 took in the bomb attack – Charlie Green, who is elevated to leader of a counter terrorist team after one mission, a position which he got for standing up to bigger boss Sarah, who herself seems recruited from a background in fashion journalism.
• While improbably pulchritudinous, the rest of the Code 9 team are made up of enough different stereotypes to fulfil the roles of likeable two-dimensional spies. There’s Jez, the ‘streetwise’ former crook (black, naturally), Rachel, who looks far more like she’s arrived from The Bill (via Hollyoaks) than actually serving in the police force, Vik, a rather anonymous entrepreneur whose role seems to be to tell others what they’ve done wrong, and Kylie, the most amiable and convincing, who is terminally ill and joined the team to make the most of the rest of her days. There’s Rob, too.
• The overall story arc that the nuclear explosion was caused by someone in MI5 is promising, and gives firm structure to what appears to be a fluid stream of one-off stories. But we do wish that in Hannah’s message from beyond the grave she’d actually say whom she suspected instead of the old “they’ve got me before I got them” spiel. Come on, tell us who “they” are, you’re dead now so it doesn’t really matter.
• And if you can ignore the grating inconsistencies and superior silliness, then the action sequences as the spies avail to hunt down their dastardly adversaries can be quite gripping. But please remember to switch off all cerebral activity before tuning in.
What was bad about it?
• Spooks Code 9 doesn’t seem to be aimed at anyone above the age of 23, which given BBC3’s target audience may be understandable. However, Spooks instils no such parameters and appeals to all ages (or rather it did until it became mediocre in the past couple of series).
• The nuclear device unleashed on the Olympic Stadium seems to have killed most of the people over 30 not just in London, but the whole country. Every single position of influence seems to have been appropriated by the young. The team’s soon-to-be-late boss Hannah (Joanne Frogatt) is in her late 20s, while the head of MI5 (we presume dear old Harry either perished or retired) is about 35 at oldest. Old people only manifest in the form of obsequious coppers or grieving parents.
• We don’t actually see the prime minister, but given the wave of yoof-kultur-iz-kool sweeping this devastated Britain, we imagine he’s either Jamiroquai or Chris Moyles. And it all has the air of one of those Children’s Film Foundation stories made in the late 70s when Jeremy, Henrietta and Godik had to save the day because their parents were just too damn stupid and busy being adults.
• The nuclear attack is further exploited to justify the actions of the characters. Interrogating an arms dealer, Rob extorts information by shooting him in the foot. “New world, new rules!” crows Kylie, with rather too much smugness, as if the freedom that enables them to torture suspects is the welcome removal of antiquated, obstructive rules on human rights. And the impact of such scenes, as well as killing off main characters, was blunted by the fact that this is a stale staple of Spooks that spent most of the last series teasing viewers about deaths rather than focusing on narrative.
• The dialogue is also problematic. The team seems to communicate in a corrupted hybrid of youth speak and the kind of officious, ominous vernacular you would expect people to employ had they spent the past five years injecting liquid Spooks into their veins. Worryingly, this is probably how such people would genuinely speak, but that doesn’t make it any more palatable.
• “Get the samples in ASAP!” barks Rachel. Those who use the phrase ‘ASAP’ are people who actually have the time to say ‘as soon as possible’, but use ‘ASAP’ as it makes them sound more important and efficient. They’re more commonly found running store cupboards on industrial estates.
• And Charlie’s pointless ruse of asking Sarah for “five-and-a-half hours” to find the person who ordered the hit on Hannah. “It put her on the back foot,” Charlie said, “she was thinking more about the half than the five.” It was never suggested that Sarah wouldn’t let them have that amount of time, and besides he crippled his own argument by compounding his request for “five-and-a-half hours” with its equivalent “330 minutes” which ‘sounds’ a lot longer than five, six or seven hours.
• Rachel also assured Charlie that “Hannah is the best person you’ll ever work for”. A statement she draws on all her 20-odd years of life experience to make.
• But the worst, and most unintentionally funny, line was when the team were musing trying to catch the elusive terrorist who had been using the identity of a dead woman. “How many more identities has she got?” mused one of the team, as the scene cut to the terrorist assuming a whole new identity – by putting on a blonde wig.
• The risible absurdities began when the assassin supposedly targeting the visiting prime minister was tracked down by his phobia to hamburger garnishing and is 15 years old (which the script at least had the decency to recognise the ridiculousness of).
• The assassin, Jermaine Lee, is notorious for being the deadliest shot in Britain – “He can shoot a head off a matchstick from a mile away” – so why does he gun down Hannah, the real target, with a bullet to the abdomen (far less lethal than a headshot) from a distance of about 200 yards, also within easy chase distance of the Code 9 team, before plummeting off a roof to his death.
• The only reason for the body shot we can surmise is that it gave Rob, an ex-medical student, the chance to practise and show off his ‘superpower’.
• There was no intimation beyond Rob’s blundering sojourn into a relocation camp, Jez’s search for his missing family and the odd reference to Kylie’s illness that there had ever been a nuclear attack; no sense of a nation crushed and in mourning. Elsewhere, shoppers happily bustled about smart department stores, students dutifully attended lectures, nightclubs were full of the same brain-dead beats and mobile phones were the most important thing in everyone’s life.
• It was almost as if a portion of London had been clinically excised from the country with an ice cream scoop while everyone else got on with their merry lives – no sign of economic collapse, no food parcels from America (although they were probably waiting the usual two years and calculating a debt repayment scheme) or dispossessed Arsenal fans.
• Thankfully there’s an absence of the ubiquitous Arab terrorists that clog up Spooks, but this creates another problem – ostensibly motiveless attacks. In the second episode, Laura wanted to avenge the death of her brother who had died in a prison riot after being locked up without charge. Her path of retribution was to cause a crush in a train station that killed three people and then threaten to bomb a university. But why? With no demented ideology she didn’t seem malevolent enough to murder civilians to get at MI5, reducing her to an unpersuasive villain waterlogged with limp dialogue such as “violence is all they understand”.
Britain From Above, BBC1
Did we like it?
What a wasted opportunity! Instead of a peaceful appreciation of the UK (the Beeb's latest Britain Is Brill Sunday night series), we got The Andrew Marr Show, with his ugly mug cropping up far too much and far too little aerial photography.
What was good about it?
• The few occasions when the programme lived up to its title, looking down on life, watching trains snake through the countryside or the effluent of London bubbling away in Beckton.
• The accompanying programme on BBC2 about the evolution of London was much more intelligent and interesting, less like wallpaper or one of those hefty coffee table tomes.
What was bad about it?
• Andrew Marr not only thrust himself into every shot he could, he delivered a script of crass broadbrush observations (everyone in Canary Wharf leaves their office at lunchtime, apparently) and lazy similes (" a national machine with its fingers in every part of the country”). His narration was no better than a third former's description of What I Did On My Holidays. He's even more intrusive, more inane than Alan Titchmarsh and David Dimbleby.
• The most pointless screen-grabbing sequence found Marr jogging on Hampstead Heath – “a lone political journalist trying to run off last night's bottle of red,” he puffed, pointlessly.
• The dots of light tracing the paths of phone calls, traffic, flights etc across a GoogleEarth version of Britain may have looked quite dazzling but didn't really convey any information we couldn't have worked out for ourselves. Marr seemed terribly impressed and breathlessly astounded by the facts he trotted out; we found it to be no better than a boring history lesson from days gone by.
• The dull footage of dull jobs: controllers monitoring the electricity supply or traffic flow from screen-packed operations rooms. And the facts that electricty usage goes up after EastEnders or taxis undertake haphazard routes was hardly revelatory.
• Even worse was the footage of a man in a helicopter checking electricity cables for hotspots.
• Intrusive classical music.
• Most of the places we saw from the air were not labelled so we had to pause the footage and try to work out the location for ourselves.
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