TV & Radio Category
Television and radio programme reviews, trailers, highlights, twilights and cinema news. Also the neglected gems from years past.
Delia Derbyshire: The Woman Who Gave Voice To The Ghost In The Machine
FLASHBACK to Delia Derbyshire (5 May 1937 – 3 July 2001).
Delia Derbyshire is the mathematics and music scholar most famous for creating the whirling intro to Dr Who. She was working at the BBC’s Radiophonic Workshop in 1963 when she was given Ron Grainer’s score.
* She used concrete sources and sine- and square-wave oscillators, tuning the results, filtering and treating, cutting so that the joins were seamless, combining sound on individual tape recorders, re-recording the results, and repeating the process, over and over again.
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Posted: 24th, November 2013 | In: Flashback, Key Posts, Music, TV & Radio | Comment
I’m A Celebrity Eats The X Factor: James Arthur Disappears Up His Own Bum Hole
Mic Wright’s Remotely Furious
HOW much money do I have to pay to have Matthew Wright change his name? I will take out a mortgage/sell a kidney/assassinate a foreign leader to make the cash required. The blubbering ballache is ruining this year’s I’m A Celebrity by becoming the go-to-guy for Bushtucker trials because he cries about everything. He’s a towering arsehole on his own talk show but obviously that bitchy veneer is just that: a thin layer of toughness masking a blancmange of bawling.
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Posted: 21st, November 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
Restless Nights: A Fabulous Timelapse Video Of London Live
IN this timelapse video of London 18000 pictures taking up 364 GB of hard drive space, shot over 8 days:
Posted: 20th, November 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
X Factor: Surprise Winner Announced
THE Sun says it knows who won the The X Factor 2013. No. The votes are not yet in. But we have a winner. says the Sun. Anorak conducted a straw poll of the office. The question: Who won The X Factor 2013?
A) Robert Mugabe
B) Len McCluskey (allegedly and unfounded etc.)
C) Hanging Chad
D) Sam Bailey?
Vote now and vote often, as they say in Uganda.
Posted: 16th, November 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
Subtitles Are Not TV’s Kite Mark: Not Unless You Want To Sing Along With Simon Cowell And Clive James
Mic Wright’s Remotely Furious.
HOMELAND is fine. Borgen is fine. The Killing was fine. If any of these shows was set in England and broadcast by ITV1, The Guardian would not give one solitary based-out-listlessly-by-Sam-Wollaston toss about them. They are entertaining but they’re not the red hot stuff that TV reviewers want you to believe you are. It’s not philistine to think subtitles are a pain the bum nor that Mel & Sue aren’t charming as hosts of the Great British Bake Off or that Richard “The Hamster” Hammond should grow up.
There is too much received wisdom in television criticism and TV chatter in general. You’re expected to enjoy but disdain The X Factor and Britain’s Got Talent, to throw a layer of irony on top to justify those hundreds of hours of Saturday night viewing. I love The X Factor and BGT unreservedly. Susan Boyle’s first BGT audition still makes me cry. It’s the product of emotional manipulation by savvy TV producers but so what? I watch sad films to make me cry, I watch nostalgic films so I can bang on about Pogs or that grim time when people enjoyed the music of Smashmouth.
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Posted: 14th, November 2013 | In: Key Posts, TV & Radio | Comments (2)
A Song For Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day
NOVEMBER 15 is Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day:
Posted: 14th, November 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
The Epic Struggle (An Epic Vine)
THE STRUGGLE:
Posted: 12th, November 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
Firefighter Rides Magic Iron Carpet (Video)
IN the Croatian port of Rijeka, a firefighter rides like Aladdin:
Posted: 12th, November 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
Teenager Sticks Bare Bum On Electric Fence With Surprising Results
THE Electric Fence Challenge:
Posted: 9th, November 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comments (5)
RIP John Cole – BBC’s Politcal Editor Hangs Up His Glasses
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Posted: 8th, November 2013 | In: Celebrities, TV & Radio | Comment
Posing For A Photo That’s Really A Video Is Awkward (A Nottingham Trent University Study)
NOTTINGHAM Trent Students Union has produced this “super awkward montage” of lots of students posing for a photo that’s really a video. You pout. Your pose. You show your best side. You tense. But the camera never clicks. You wobble. You relax:
Spotter: David Pescovitz
Posted: 7th, November 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
Mic Wright’s Remotely Furious: Richard Hammond Builds A Planet But Fails To Go And Live On It
Mic Wright is Remotely Furious about Richard Hammond Builds A Planet:
ON the first day, Richard Hammond looked at the darkness and said: “THIS is the GREATEST darkness EVER!” Then Hammond said “Let there be light” and there was light and the light was proper tasty. And Richard Hammond he was happy. Happy, grinning, goonish god of denim and middle aged delinquency.
Richard Hammond Builds A Planet represents everything that’s wrong with modern TV and, in fact, with humanity in general. Top Gear is brilliant telly but do we need James May presenting every programme about masculinity, Jeremy Clarkson contemplating a run at parliament and Richard Hammond cleaning up the overspill like a human snot rag or a pair of particularly unloved curtains? We do not.
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Posted: 7th, November 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment (1)
Dizzee Rascal Goes Nutso Against Radio 1
Dizzee Rascal is a loveable scamp isn’t he? He went from grime king to the molly court jester who appeared on Newsnight saying he wouldn’t mind being Prime Minister.
He probably doesn’t stand much of a chance now as his diplomacy skills have been left wanting after he went off on one against Radio 1 on Twitter.
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Posted: 6th, November 2013 | In: Celebrities, TV & Radio | Comment
Colour Pictures Of The Addams Family TV Show Set
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Posted: 6th, November 2013 | In: Flashback, TV & Radio | Comment
Lady Gaga Meets Dot Cotton For A TV Road Trip: Photos
LADY Gaga and Dot Cotton have shared Graham Norton’s sofa. Gaga might have thought Dot Cotton a new internet address format, a social working site for actors. But Dot is June Brown, 85, a fragrant actress whose ability to smoke on the telly marks her out as likeable.
Other than on EastEnders, where June has played Bible-wetting, launderette wallah Dot since 1985, we last saw her without her omnipresent smouldering prop on the BBC Two show Respect Your Elders. She was wearing a new pendant on which had been inscribed the order “Do Not Resuscicate”. (She had spelt “Resuscitate” wrong.) Before that June was on the Who Do You Think You Are? genealogy show, also on the BBC, retracing her Jewish routes to Spain and the Inquisition.
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Posted: 6th, November 2013 | In: Celebrities, TV & Radio | Comment
Do We Want To Bring Back Morph?
IN a move that normally grates – as in, famous entity starting a Kickstarter campaign, which seems a bit unfair when not-famous folk are trying to get projects off the ground in the same way – Aardman Animations has launched a Kickstarter so they can bring back Morph for a new series.
Of course, you’ll know Aardman through the Wallace and Gromit films (and more), and they’re hoping to bring back their first creation for a brand new series of short films.
Morph first appeared on our radars all the way back in 1977 in Tony Hart’s show Take Hart. Alas, Morph has been off air since the ’90s which is why Aardman’s Peter Lord is seeking £75,000 to bring him back to life.
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Posted: 4th, November 2013 | In: Reviews, TV & Radio | Comment
If Shaun Ryder Can’t Convince Us Of Alien Life Can Flava Flav?
ALIENS with spaceships have advanced brains and control technology we humans can’t even imagine. Which is why they chose to fly to planet Earth and hover over Shaun Ryder from the Happy Mondays. ‘Yes,’ thought Zogxxypt the Mega Brain from the planet C&JUUTB,’ if Shaun Ryder says he saw alien life and tells everyone else, the rest of humanity will believe him and accept us. Shaun Ryder is out best chance of success.’
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Posted: 2nd, November 2013 | In: Celebrities, TV & Radio | Comment
Selly Telly: Prize Island And Jonathan Ross For Guinness Milk ITV’s Stupid Viewers
THE trouble with this Guinness advert below is the same problem facing product placement on British TV: treating the audience like idiots is not endearing. This hateful advert filled the space in Jonathan Ross’s tired ITV chatshow. Appearing in the same week as ITV’s gameshow Prize Island, the ad shows what ITV thinks of audiences.
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Posted: 2nd, November 2013 | In: The Consumer, TV & Radio | Comment
Mic Wright’s Remotely Furious: Educating Yorkshire And Refusing To Be Filtered By Hugh Grant And His Thought Censors
Educating Yorkshire: teacher Matthew Burton reads to his class
THE British press is dominated not by truth tellers and the brave but by the privileged, the prickish, the petulant and the pestilent. I chose that last one carefully. The worst of our commentator class are like rats with bubonic plague, the nastiness they spread is ignorance, intolerance and hate. They want to persuade you that your fellow humans are heartless, that benefits are only paid to the pathetic and villainous. They want you to believe that no one besides you and a few acceptable rich people should have money. Bad news sells and if they can’t find it they simply make it up.
You might think that new legislation and rules following Leveson will make a difference. They won’t. People like Hugh Grant – once caught in a car with a hooker – and Steve Coogan – who wants us to forget about his former love of cocaine – are on the side of state legislation of the press. They want me to sign up for a special badge to exercise my freedom of expression. If celebrity arseholes like them win, I will move offshore and continue to write what I want, when I want, for who I want with impunity.
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Posted: 1st, November 2013 | In: Reviews, TV & Radio | Comment (1)
Good Riddance To Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? A Pointless Spectacle Of Greed
FIFTEEN years ago – and it seems much, much longer than that – Who Wants To Be a Millionaire? first aired on our screens. And now, it is set to end following Chris Tarrant’s decision to leave the show.
He said: “It’s been a huge part of my life for fifteen years and I’ve loved every minute of it, but it is time for me to move on from Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. It’s been the most remarkable journey and I consider myself very fortunate to have been associated with Millionaire from its inception.”
And good riddance.
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Posted: 1st, November 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
Mouse Battles Cracker (Video)
MOUSE V Cracker? Will he make it? Will the cracker prevail – or crack?
PS- Who makes Russian crackers – De Beers?
Posted: 31st, October 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
In 1976 Margaret Hamilton Terrified The Children Of Sesame Street
HEY, kids, ready to be scared? Sesame Street thought so. On February 10, 1976 , the Children’s Television Workshop aired episode #847. The special guest star was Margaret Hamilton, who reprised her role as The Wizard of Oz’s Wicked Witch of the West.
She’s been on the magic box earlier, telling the kids tuned into Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood to show the viewers that she was not a real witch just a normal woman.
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Posted: 30th, October 2013 | In: Flashback, TV & Radio | Comment
Photographer Falls Into Surf On Sky News Storm Report
THE Great Storm competition: which reporter could get wettest? We have a winner. He’s immersed himself in the news story:
Posted: 28th, October 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
Dog Attempts To Mate With Bart Simpson
CALL Operation Yewtree. Child star Bart Simpson is being assaulted by Shep in the BBC studios. Down, boy. Down!
Posted: 25th, October 2013 | In: TV & Radio | Comment
Scarface Meets Seinfeld (With Canned Laughter)
I HATE Canned laughter. It shreds TV’s show’s soul. How bad can it get? Take a look at this – Scarface Meets Seinfeld:
Posted: 24th, October 2013 | In: Film, TV & Radio | Comment
