Heroes
3x08 Villains
Backstory episodes like this are often among Heroes' best, if you ask me. But that ending... my God that was gruesome! It says a lot about American TV that they'll merrily show a decapitated body -- and the head lying separately by itself -- but not so much swearing as "God" and not so much nudity as a bottom. What's wrong with that nation?!
Spooks
7x07 The Mole
Oh dear! Oh my! Not just for Harry being interrogated and the revelation of the mole, including a particularly vicious murder (though, next to that decapitation...), but because there were times when I actually liked Ros! Argh! "You are a fool" were probably the most satisfying four words in a drama for a while, especially as no good guys seem to be allowed to take appropriate revenge or deliver appropriate put-downs these days.
Tuesday, 2 December 2008
Music
Day & Age by the Killers
[2nd listen]
Every time I get a new Killers album I'm not sure about it, then it slowly grows on me. So it was with their first, Hot Fuss, and their second, Sam's Town, and now with their third, Day & Age -- so, see, every time. (Sawdust doesn't count -- it's a collection of B-sides & rarities, not an album, and I'd heard most of its tracks over the years.)
Trying to predict ahead to my long-term thoughts (always tricky), I'm not sure there's anything on D&A that will I grow to love as much as Somebody Told Me, Jenny Was a Friend of Mine, When You Were Young, Bling (Confessions of a King), Tranquilize, or my unusual favourite-of-all, exitlude; or, indeed, several other tracks from those first two albums. The tracks with the best chance, I would say, are Losing Touch, Joy Ride (great chorus... until the last two words) and A Crippling Blow. But we'll see.
(All track names link to iTunes, so you can hear previews.)
[2nd listen]
Every time I get a new Killers album I'm not sure about it, then it slowly grows on me. So it was with their first, Hot Fuss, and their second, Sam's Town, and now with their third, Day & Age -- so, see, every time. (Sawdust doesn't count -- it's a collection of B-sides & rarities, not an album, and I'd heard most of its tracks over the years.)
Trying to predict ahead to my long-term thoughts (always tricky), I'm not sure there's anything on D&A that will I grow to love as much as Somebody Told Me, Jenny Was a Friend of Mine, When You Were Young, Bling (Confessions of a King), Tranquilize, or my unusual favourite-of-all, exitlude; or, indeed, several other tracks from those first two albums. The tracks with the best chance, I would say, are Losing Touch, Joy Ride (great chorus... until the last two words) and A Crippling Blow. But we'll see.
(All track names link to iTunes, so you can hear previews.)
Magazines
Radio Times 6-12 November 2008
I posted the fold-out cover for this issue the other day -- "Who's the Doctor?" it demands, playing in on the fact that Proper Dave's leaving (in 2010) and Other Dave's also playing "the Doctor" in a special called The Next Doctor. Oo-ooh! (I also can't believe I've not seen anyone else applying Proper Dave and Other Dave to this situation yet.)
Anyway, this issue has a nice little preview of that ep, spoiler-free; plus a preview of the Sarah Jane finale, spoiler-filled; and a Review of 2008 that starts with a (dull and informationless) Catherine Tate interview. Also, a rather scathing piece on Survivors and some letters about the Strictly thing.
I posted the fold-out cover for this issue the other day -- "Who's the Doctor?" it demands, playing in on the fact that Proper Dave's leaving (in 2010) and Other Dave's also playing "the Doctor" in a special called The Next Doctor. Oo-ooh! (I also can't believe I've not seen anyone else applying Proper Dave and Other Dave to this situation yet.)
Anyway, this issue has a nice little preview of that ep, spoiler-free; plus a preview of the Sarah Jane finale, spoiler-filled; and a Review of 2008 that starts with a (dull and informationless) Catherine Tate interview. Also, a rather scathing piece on Survivors and some letters about the Strictly thing.
Websites
from FireboxAnd the prize for Oddest Christmas-Related Service Ever goes to... CrapWrap (which, I should probably add, is a trademark) is Firebox's new optional giftwrapping service. But rather than providing the normal Christmas-movie-perfect wrapping these services normally produce, CrapWrap wraps your gift badly. Really badly. Really, really, really badly, in fact. Not only that, it'll cost you £3.95. How gullible do you have to be to fork out £3.95 to have your present wrapped so badly you could unquestionably imitate it yourself? The only difference would be, you wouldn't have an official sticker on it. Ludicrous.
Doctor Who Adventure Calendar
I forgot to mention this yesterday, but the annual Doctor Who Adventure Calendar has begun again on the official BBC Who site. Day one was a rather pathetic Christmas greeting from David Tennant, while today's is a more interesting text interview with director Graeme Harper, answering fans' questions. (Incidentally, the link at the top is a rather undramatic text version of the calendar. Go to the site's front page for the full door-opening experience.)
Zavvi struggles this Christmas
Click to enlarge.
Pulped Genitals -or- Riviera Dogs
So, yesterday, I mentioned a certain parody screenplay/scene I was writing for my degree. Well, today, here it is to download.
Can you guess whose style it's in? (I expect so.)
Warning: normally I try to keep this blog family-friendly, but this piece contains lots of nasty swearing and some pretty nasty violence too. Don't say I didn't warn you!
Can you guess whose style it's in? (I expect so.)
Warning: normally I try to keep this blog family-friendly, but this piece contains lots of nasty swearing and some pretty nasty violence too. Don't say I didn't warn you!
Poem of the Day: In Drear-Nighted December
by John Keats
This week, Poem of the Day is presenting a series of poems relating to December. Today's second is by John Keats, an English Romantic poet -- just like yesterday's. Maybe they really liked Winter? Or, possibly, liked to espouse their dislike of it -- certainly, the title suggests that.
Either way, they wrote about it, and here it is:
Originally written in December 1817 and first published in 1829. The version reproduced here combines the varied formatting (and two differences in spelling) from a couple of different sources into a version I prefer. If they differ -- and therefore, clearly, neither is definitive -- why shouldn't I?
This week, Poem of the Day is presenting a series of poems relating to December. Today's second is by John Keats, an English Romantic poet -- just like yesterday's. Maybe they really liked Winter? Or, possibly, liked to espouse their dislike of it -- certainly, the title suggests that.
Either way, they wrote about it, and here it is:
In drear-nighted December,
Too happy, happy tree,
Thy branches ne'er remember
Their green felicity:
The north cannot undo them,
With a sleety whistle through them;
Nor frozen thawings glue them
From budding at the prime.
In drear-nighted December,
Too happy, happy brook,
Thy bubblings ne'er remember
Apollo's summer look;
But with a sweet forgetting,
They stay their crystal fretting,
Never, never petting
About the frozen time.
Ah! would 'twere so with many
A gentle girl and boy!
But were there ever any
Writh'd not at passing joy?
The feel of not to feel it,
When there is none to heal it,
Nor numbed sense to steal it,
Was never said in rhyme.
Originally written in December 1817 and first published in 1829. The version reproduced here combines the varied formatting (and two differences in spelling) from a couple of different sources into a version I prefer. If they differ -- and therefore, clearly, neither is definitive -- why shouldn't I?
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