TV

Britain's Brightest
1x06 Episode 6 [season finale]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Dexter
6x01 Those Kinds of Things
Rather behind on Dexter now (season eight starts Stateside in a few months), so time to crack on with catching up. And it's as good as ever, with a nice theme of religious hypocrisy kicking off this season.

Elementary
1x10 The Leviathan
Did they replace someone high-up on Elementary after a few episodes, because I think it's continuing to improve...

Room 101: Extra Storage
13x05 Episode 5
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Everything or Nothing (2012)
[#14 in 100 Films in a Year 2013]

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

A couple of small things this week... which should continue for the next couple of weeks, actually, with a moderately steady stream of pre-orders. So that's nice then.

Number of titles in collection: 1,533 [up 2]
Of which DVDs: 1,151 [up 1]
Of which Blu-rays: 382 [up 1]

Number of discs in collection: 3,850 [up 2]
Number of films in collection: 1,609 [up 1]
Number of TV episodes in collection: 5,722 [up 4]
Number of short films in collection: 374 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

Britain's Brightest
1x05 Episode 5
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

The Graham Norton Show
12x15 (1/2/13 edition)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Stella
2x04 Episode 4

Top Gear
19x02 (3/2/13 edition)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

TV

Arrow
1x06 Legacies

Charlie Brooker's Weekly Wipe
1x01 (31/1/13 edition)

How I Met Your Mother
8x02 The Pre-Nup
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

The Last Leg
2x02 (1/2/13 edition)
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Articles

From Sunderland to Australia – message in a bottle makes it Down Under
(from Sunderland Echo)

A boy who dispatched a message-in-a-bottle (written on a Doctor Who postcard) from the UK in August 2011 had a reply informing him it had reached Australia in January 2013! Quite incredible, really.

TV

Death in Paradise
2x05 Episode 5
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Pointless
6x44 (14/5/12 edition)
Last time I watched this series of Pointless was September! And yet I have (almost) all the episodes since just ready to be watched. This is what happens when you find software that lets you download from iPlayer.

The Sarah Millican Television Programme
2x04 Episode 4
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Films

The Artist (2011)
[#12 in 100 Films in a Year 2013]

Black Death (2010)
[#13 in 100 Films in a Year 2013]

TV

Britain's Brightest
1x03 Episode 3

Stella
2x03 Episode 3

Yes, Prime Minister [2013]
1x04 A Diplomatic Dilemma

TV

Elementary
1x09 You Do It To Yourself
Another better than average episode, I thought. Probably because it was at least in some part inspired by an original Conan Doyle story. But still, s'all good.

Person of Interest
1x23 Firewall [season finale]
Ah, the season one finale... which leaves me in an odd limbo between Channel 5 (who just re-started and are way back in the middle of the season) and the US (who are halfway through season two now). Plough ahead or wait to be caught up? I dunno, I think I'll just go back to several-seasons-behind Dexter.

Pointless Celebrities
2x07 (2/6/12 edition)

The Sarah Millican Television Programme
2x03 Episode 3
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

TV

Blandings
1x03 Company for Gertrude
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Films

The Cabin in the Woods (2012)
[#11 in 100 Films in a Year 2013]

this week on 100 Films

Firstly, the UK TV premiere of Duncan Jones' second film, Source Code, is on Channel 4 tonight at 9pm. It's rather good, and my archive review (new to the new blog) is at the end of this post. You could just scroll to it, or you could keep reading...

Secondly, it's February, which means the new-look update for January is available to read. I've revamped it to make it more interesting (I hope), including a Top 5 list to debate and discuss (not that anyone has), so do take a look.

Thirdly, in the last week I announced a new challenge for myself. Full details at the link, of course.

Fourthly, just one new review was published to 100 Films in a Year this week...


The Extraordinary Adventures of Adèle Blanc-Sec (2010)

The film finds itself with a 12 certificate in the UK, and that age might be the perfect target audience. There’s dinosaurs and mummies, car chases and fireballs, derring do brushing up against irreverent humour, and even some boobies.

Read more here.



And finally, new to the new blog...


Lesbian Vampire Killers (2009)

from the title and blatant Hammer Horror references, critics and viewers presumed they were set for a Shaun of the Dead-style ready-made-cult-classic horror homage. Instead, it takes widely recognised Hammer tropes and aims the rest of its content at a Nuts-reading audience.

Read more here.


Source Code (2011)

The efficiency of storytelling is to the credit of both Jones and screenwriter Ben Ripley: rather than emphasise the Groundhog Day element of the plot, he finds the bomb on his second trip and makes significant headway with each recurring one. All sorts of parts of that could have been stretched out, but rather than padding we’re left with something that’s quite taut.

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

TV

Person of Interest
1x22 No Good Deed

Splash!
1x05 Final
[Watch it (again) on ITV Player.]

Top Gear
19x01 (27/1/13 edition)
After an abnormally long time away (barring the Top-Gear-in-name-only Bond special), it's great fun to have this back on our screens. I know people seem to despise it in equal measure to the huge viewing figures it gets for BBC Two, but never mind them, because it's funny.
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

A pile of post this Saturday morning sees the statistics jump at the last second. Six new acquisitions, with one being a near-like-for-like BD upgrade. But ooh, pretty book.

Number of titles in collection: 1,531 [up 5]
Of which DVDs: 1,150 [up 3]
Of which Blu-rays: 381 [up 2]

Number of discs in collection: 3,848 [up 6]
Number of films in collection: 1,608 [up 4]
Number of TV episodes in collection: 5,718 [up 6]
Number of short films in collection: 374 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

Britain's Brightest
1x04 Episode 4
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

The Graham Norton Show
12x14 (25/1/13 edition)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

How I Met Your Mother
8x01 Farhampton
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Room 101: Extra Storage
13x04 Episode 4
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

Doctor Who
1x41 A Bargain of Necessity
1x42 Prisoners of Conciergerie [season finale]

Being parts five and six of The Reign of Terror, released on DVD this week. Like yesterday's The Tyrant of France, A Bargain of Necessity no longer exist in the archives and has been animated for the DVD. For my thoughts on the animation, see yesterday's TV post.

It makes for a fast-paced end to the serial, particularly the last episode. And it's also the end of Who's first season. We think of season finales being quite a modern, US-derived concept -- and, indeed, in the way we know them today they are -- but The Reign of Terror certainly ends on a note of awareness that the series is about to take an extended break... even if there is a "Next Time" card.


The Last Leg
2x01 (25/1/13 edition)
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]


Yes, Prime Minister [2013]
1x03 Gentlemen's Agreement

TV

Death in Paradise
2x04 Episode 4
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]


Doctor Who
1x39 A Change of Identity
1x40 The Tyrant of France

Being parts three and four of six-parter The Reign of Terror, released on DVD this week. Two of the serial's middle episodes, The Tyrant of France and A Bargain of Necessity (which I'll be watching tomorrow), no longer exist in the archives, so for the DVD have been animated to fan-made recordings of the full soundtrack. I'm all for the idea of animating missing episodes of Doctor Who -- the chances of many (or any) more being recovered are remote, so why not plug the gap in this way? It's only a shame it's so expensive and can't be done for all 106 lost episodes.

That said, I wouldn't want to see any more done in this style. You don't have to slavishly emulate the static wide shots used in '60s Doctor Who -- indeed, one may well argue you explicitly shouldn't -- but this seems to have been edited by a child with ADHD who has no concept of the purpose of specific shots. It jumps around between close-ups, extreme close-ups, high-angles, and more, sometimes at lightning speed, most of the time to little or no effect. It's a real shame, because the actual art and underlying animation is good enough, but the choice of camera angles and the whip-fast way they're cut between not only jars with the '60s soundtrack and style of the remaining four episodes, it's also plain amateurish in and of itself.

Recently they rejected Ian Levine's animated reconstruction of Shada. I'm not entirely sure why (I don't know if it was made public), but one mooted reason was the animation wasn't professional enough. Well, the screenshots you can see from a quick Googling look alright, but that's not motion. Either the full thing must be really dreadful quality, or I'm not sure the commissioners at 2entertain have much taste...


The Great Comic Relief Bake Off
Episode 4 (of 4)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]


John Bishop's Only Joking
1x03 Episode 3

DVD Extras

Audio commentary on Doctor Who: A Bargain of Necessity

Or The Reign of Terror part five. This is one of two episodes in the serial missing from the archive which has been animated for the DVD (more here), but the animation wasn't complete when the commentaries were recorded, so they had to come up with something different. For this episode, fan/journalist/comedian Toby Hadoke interviews missing episode hunters Philip Morris and Paul Vanezis for 25 minutes.

TV

Doctor Who
1x37 A Land of Fear
1x38 Guests of Madame Guillotine
Being parts one and two of The Reign of Terror, released on DVD yesterday. It's been a while since I watched any first Doctor adventures, so I'd forgotten quite how often they go off on tangents for no particular reason. I wonder just how many six-parters are actually four-parters with the odd episode-filling aside thrown in... Still, it's all good fun. And, as the last story of the series' first season, feels particularly season-finale-like, with lots of references to previous adventures and whatnot.

The Great Comic Relief Bake Off
Episode 3 (of 4)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

The Sarah Millican Television Programme
2x02 Episode 2