Thursday 5 June 2008

TV

Derren Brown: Trick or Treat
2x02 Kitten
The show with possibly the coolest title sequence on TV (it includes clues to every episode) continues with an episode in which a 19-year-old student is offered £500 to not kill a kitten. It might sound easy, but when you've got Derren's array of tricks levelled against you nothing is as it seems....

The Graham Norton Show
3x08 (5/6/08 edition)

Heroes
2x07 Out of Time
Certain media outlets persist in insisting that season two of Heroes is dull. Perhaps their memories of season one are too nostalgia-tinged, or perhaps they listened too hard to the early criticisms of others? Season two has just as much going on as the first -- occasionally not enough, occasionally (like tonight's episode) packed with incident, revelations and cliffhangers... including a fantastic final moment that merged two great surprises into a single shot.

Holby Blue
2x12 Episode 12 [season finale]
Holby Blue has been a lot better this season, focussing more on individual storylines than one arcing uber-criminal plot and spacing out plot developments in the characters' personal lives a tad more realistically. It also swerved away from repeating a first season storyline, in the process thankfully showing us a lot less of that bitch from the CPS. Long may she barely feature.

Red Dwarf
2x01 Kryten
Despite being a fan of Red Dwarf for over a decade, and owning all eight series on DVD, there are still many episodes I've never seen from series two to six. So, having recently re-watched the first series, I'm intending to continue on through them. As much as I enjoy the show's first six episodes, this series two opener seems to be a step-up in quality. Hopefully it continues.

Spooks
4x04 Road Trip (aka Infiltration of a New Threat)

Films

Gangs of New York (2002)
[2nd half; 3rd watch]
When I saw Gangs of New York on its original cinema release it was the first Scorsese film I'd seen. Six years later, I'm more familiar with his body of work, having seen a further seven & a half of his films (including several of his most praised). I think Gangs of New York is still my favourite though. It's flawed, but I like the sprawling narrative, which has an almost mythical style; the brutal fights; and Daniel Day-Lewis' performance is fantastic. Gangs is a very Scorsese film too, using a variety of his usual techniques and exploring his usual themes, but applied almost to their genesis in the early days of New York City. I've only seen the likes of Taxi Driver, Goodfellas or The Departed once and am in no huge rush to sit through them again (well, maybe The Departed), but this is the third time I've seen Gangs of New York. Though, to be fair, I watched the other three within the last year and the last time I watched Gangs was probably four years ago... but still, I like it more. So there.

Fiction

Devil May Care by Sebastian Faulks writing as Ian Fleming
Chapter 7
Bond heads to the Middle East for the first time, an area of the globe Fleming disliked (Faulks cleverly uses some of Fleming's views as Bond's own). There he meets Darius Alizadeh, head of station in Tehran and, as a character, a natural successor to the likes of From Russia With Love's Kerim Bey. In what I assume is a move based on Fleming's style, Faulks has an annoying habit of characters finding any excuse (including interrupting more important discussions) to narrate their entire life history to Bond.