TV

Bring Me Morecambe & Wise
1x01 From Stage to Screen

Castle
2x17 Tick, Tick, Tick…
This feels very much like a season finale two-parter, which is very odd as it's still very much mid-season.
[Watch it (again) on Demand 5.]

Derren Brown: Fear & Faith
Part 2 (of 2)
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

The Mentalist
5x03 Not One Red Cent
[Watch it (again) on Demand 5.]

TV

1001 Things You Should Know
1x05 (16/11/12 edition)
Featuring one of the more irritating contestants I've ever seen on a quiz show. And he won too! Which means we have to suffer him next time as well. Ugh.
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Hebburn
1x05 She Doesn't Just Give It Away
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Hunted
1x07 Khyber
I presume that was meant to be an "is Sam poisoned?!" cliffhanger, which was promptly spoilt by plastering her all over the trailer. Not that we don't know she'll survive, but still.
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

TV

1001 Things You Should Know
1x04 (15/11/12 edition)
On which two players amass all the money, then a third swoops in, finally gets some questions right, and waltzes off with over £5,500. Seems somehow immoral...
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Live at the Apollo
8x01 Episode 1
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Articles

Hunted creator Frank Spotnitz confirms Sam Hunter spin-off series
by David Brown (from Radio Times)

So, basically, Hunted series 2 but by a different name. And probably not on over here. Or on Sky1, I suppose, but they seem to be doing less pinching of drama these days than they used to.

TV

1001 Things You Should Know
1x03 (14/11/12 edition)
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Rolf's Animal Clinic
1x04 Episode 4
[Watch it (again) on Demand 5.]

Films

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Part I (2012)
[#90 in 100 Films in a Year 2012]

Adapting the first two books of Frank Miller's seminal tale. This hits UK DVD and Blu-ray next Monday, while the second half is out in the US at the end of January.

Articles

Tweetnotes - Skyfall
by Andrew Ellard (from Storify)

Ellard analyses the latest Bond film in his usual insightful way. A few massive spoilers in there, so make sure you've seen the film first (but then, who hasn't?)

TV

1001 Things You Should Know
1x01 (12/11/12 edition)
Weirdly, Virgin put it on eventually. Handy. It's a nice show, because most of the questions are so easy it makes you feel quite clever.
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Elementary
1x03 Child Predator

The Hour
2x01 Episode 1
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Never Mind the Buzzcocks
26x07 Episode 7
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Yes, Prime Minister
2x06 The Patron of the Arts

Films

The Call of Cthulhu (2005)
[#89 in 100 Films in a Year 2012]

DVD Extras

Extras on The Call of Cthulhu DVD

These are headed up by half-hour making-of Hearing "The Call", which is both informative and entertaining, with good insight on how they made this quite fascinating production for virtually no money. It's better put together than some behind-the-scenes features on professional releases and definitely worth a watch for anyone who enjoyed the film.

The disc also houses eight minutes of deleted footage, including more of the stop-motion monster; a few easter eggs in the same vein; galleries of both behind-the-scenes photos and production stills; and the obligatory trailer, which doesn't sell the film quite as well as it could in my opinion.

TV

A Mark Heap double bill...

Friday Night Dinner
2x06 The Mouse [season finale]
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Spy
2x05 Codename: Family Bonds

Comics

Bleeding Cool Magazine #0

With Bleeding Cool Magazine #1 due any week now (it was originally slated for October), I've finally got round to reading June's #0 preview issue. It's exactly what you'd expect in many ways -- gossipy, irreverent, but informative. Even more if the latter than the website, really, because it's had a bit more time and effort poured in than the primarily news-driven site.


Sword of Sorcery #0
featuring Amethyst by Christy Marx & Aaron Lopresti
and Beowulf by Tony Bedard & Jesus Saiz

DC's new fantasy comic is, for want of a less demeaning adjective, a bit girly. Back-up strip Beowulf, a sci-fi/fantasy retelling of the classic poem, shows more promise.


Talon #0 by James Tynion IV & Guillem March

Spinning out of the recent Batman epic, The Court of Owls, this launch issue is all setup. Tynion IV has cut his teeth writing the back-up strips on several Bat titles, and with Scott Snyder helping out by co-plotting there's sure to be promise here.

Articles

The Colourisation Debate - Not All Black and White
by Julian Upton (from MovieMail)

Some time ago I had to sit through a lecture by an ‘expert’ on colour cinema, who began by showing a YouTube clip of the colourised version of It’s a Wonderful Life. “What’s that?” he asked. “It’s a Wonderful Life,” we said. “No,” he said in his best Jeremy Clarkson voice, “it’s an abomination.”

He then showed a YouTube clip of the black-and-white It’s a Wonderful Life — a clip that was horizontally stretched, pixelated and whose sound and image was all but destroyed by the low-quality upload — and proceeded to talk about that as if it wasn’t an abomination.

Such a true example. The rest of the piece is very good too.

this week on 100 Films

No new reviews were published to 100 Films in a Year this week! But Bill Cunningham New York is on Sky Arts 1 tonight, so my review of that will go live later today at this location.

Still, new to the new blog there was...


High Plains Drifter (1973)

Clint rides into town, has a beer and a bottle of whiskey, kills three men for no good reason and rapes the only woman in sight. It’s a fine introduction to our ‘hero’. But instead of setting the sheriff on him, the townsfolk bend over backwards to help him (more or less). Why? Are they as uncaring as he? Or do they need something from this capable man?

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

TV

Children in Need 2012
Specifically, everything after midnight; though the link below will just take you to all the CiN stuff on iPlayer.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Have I Got News For You
44x05 (9/11/12 edition; extended repeat)
[Watch the extended version (again) on iPlayer.]

Merlin
5x07 A Lesson in Vengeance
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Collection Count

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

This week, my Paralympics Blu-ray finally arrives, a Dynamo box set I'd half forgotten I ordered also turns up, and Masters of Cinema's gorgeous Passion of Joan of Arc BD arrives a week or so before its release date (yay for direct ordering).

Number of titles in collection: 1,504 [up 3]
Of which DVDs: 1,145 [up 1]
Of which Blu-rays: 359 [up 2]

Number of discs in collection: 3,753 [up 10]
Number of films in collection: 1,545 [up 1]
Number of TV episodes in collection: 5,700 [up 11]
Number of short films in collection: 370 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

Children in Need 2012
As ever, there'll be more CiN tomorrow to cover the post-midnight stuff (which is, naturally, still on as I post this).
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Derren Brown: Fear & Faith
Part 1 (of 2)
Or, to put it another way, Derren Brown: Fear -- next week is the Faith part. Although it does work, because there's certainly some faith in here and I wouldn't be at all surprised to discover there's some fear in religious faith.
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

TV

1001 Things You Should Know
1x02 (13/11/12 edition)
C4's new daytime quiz show, which I primarily watched because it's presented by Sandi Toksvig and she seemed an arbiter of quality. It's not bad, but it's basically just a simple question format -- pleasant enough but hardly taxing. Not likely to make the jump to a prime-time variant. (And I started with episode two because episode one wasn't available on Virgin Media's version of 4oD, because Virgin are useless like that.)
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Hebburn
1x04 Feeling Dynamic
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Hunted
1x06 Ambassadors
See also today's Articles.
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Only Connect
Children in Need Special: Goldfingers vs Fowls
I did surprisingly well at this... though, as you may remember from last year, they apparently make it slightly easier for the celebrity/special editions, so that might not be saying a whole lot.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Articles

BBC1 spy drama Hunted axed after one series by Tom Cole
and
ITV axes James Nesbitt medical drama Monroe by Jack Seale
(from Radio Times)

A pair of cancellations yesterday. Can't say I'm surprised by Hunted -- it's never quite clicked -- but it's a shame about Monroe. It faced unbeatable competition from BBC's not-as-good behemoth, New Tricks, and I should imagine was dropped because of it.

TV

Arrow
1x02 Honor Thy Father

Spy
2x04 Codename: Mistaken Identity