Monday 6 April 2009

TV

Law & Order: UK
1x07 Trust
A very powerful episode, well written and performed. I've never been a huge fan of Freema Agyeman, if I'm honest -- Martha as a character made a great change from Rose, but I was only ever 90% convinced by her acting. In this, however, she did a great job. The triumphant conclusion is, depressingly, unlikely in real life, but made for a suitably pleasing ending here.
This is the last we'll see of L&O:UK for a while, though technically it's not actually the season finale. It had a season finale feel to it, suggesting foresight on the part of the makers, but 13 episodes have been made -- yep, ITV are playing at their usual game and taking a break for an unspecified amount of time. God only knows what goes through their schedulers' minds.
[Watch it (again) on ITV Player.]

Mad Men
2x08 A Night to Remember
Little Betty Draper finally makes a stand for herself. Hurrah! But the character I really felt for tonight was ever-confident Joan Holloway, getting a sniff of a higher-powered career she was really good at and then having it cruelly snatched away. Poor Joanie.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

The Wire
1x05 The Pager

Articles

Microsoft Encarta Dies After Long Battle With Wikipedia by Noam Cohen
(from Bits at The New York Times)
Ah, Encarta... I remember it with a vague amount of fondness. Mainly because my tiny little home town was on there.
"In January, Wikipedia got 97% of the visits that Web surfers in the United States made to online encyclopedias... Encarta was second, with 1.27%. "

More Torchwood For 2009 by Dave Golder
(from SFX)
"Radio 4 which has confirmed there will be a Torchwood audio series, possibly for broadcast in June, but would not give us any more information at the present."
This following the success of one-off radio drama Lost Souls on both broadcast and CD last year. Online retailers are listing three CD releases for this series, which would suggest anywhere from three to six one-hour dramas.

Reviewer Loses Job Over Wolverine Review by Dave Golder
(from SFX)
"Fox News has fired an entertainment blogger Roger Friedman who wrote for FoxNews.com, after he published a review of the Wolverine movie (released, of course, by Fox) based on a one of the pirated copies that have been doing the rounds."
Poor guy. Though clearly lacking in common sense. This is by far the funniest bit though:
"he even gave it a good review... Fox released a statement saying: “Roger Friedman’s views in no way reflect the views... 20th Century Fox Film Corporation." Ha!

And finally...

Roads named after Discworld books
(from BBC News)
Seriously. And this is in the town that's been twinned with Ankh-Morpork. No, seriously.

Wikipedia

Apparently I'm the only person in the world who can't currently access that inestimable web resource, Wikipedia. Which is annoying because, as you may've noticed, I tend to use it for linking-up all of my posts.

Apologies if today's have dodgy links, then -- they're all done through guesswork.