TV

8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown
5x01 (3/1/14 edition)
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Celebrity Mastermind
2013-14 Episode 4 (of 10)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Friends
7x03 The One with Phoebe's Cookies [4th or so watch]
7x04 The One with Rachel's Assistant [4th or so watch]

Veronica Mars
3x01 Welcome Wagon
With the movie out in March, it seemed like it was time to crack on with the third (and final) season.

TV

Doctor Who
33x16 The Time of the Doctor [Christmas special; 2nd watch]

This definitely plays better second time round, I felt, when you're not racing to keep up with all the tiny little throwaway details and work out what the blazes is going on. It has some funny bits, some exciting bits, and most of all some emotional bits: the death of Handles, Clara's grandmother's anecdote, and, a little to my surprise, because I only felt it on second viewing, the Eleventh Doctor's final moments.

That said, it's still an almighty mess in other areas. Things we've been wondering about for years are "explained" with half a line of, "that theory you had? Yeah, that's probably it" -- or, to put it another way, not really explained at all. Kovarian & co blew up the TARDIS? OK, thought as much... but how? And when, exactly? And how was it stopped again? Then there was all the stuff in the episode itself, which was a flood of ideas rushed through without due weight or attention, at times.

And don't get me started on the 13th regeneration explanation. There was such potential for story there, and yet Moffat introduces it as a needless obstacle about halfway through, and then around 20 minutes later solves it with a hand wave. It didn't need to be resolved now, it could've waited -- could've waited for someone who had a decent story based around it -- but no, Moffat must manage and control Who's canon, and so he must engineer a way in which he can sort out the 12 regenerations limit a whole two lives early. Grr.

A mixed bag, then. Hopefully Capaldi's reign will signal a fresh start and a return to a more consistent high standard.


Sherlock
3x02 The Sign of Three

I enjoyed that a lot. Seems there were some complaints online about it going nowhere and being unfocused... but it all came together at the end, which is a lesson in watching something through rather than judging it based on the first 20 minutes. Morons. I imagine some will still have objected to the lighter-than-usual tone, but I thought it was both fun and funny, and had a clever reveal at the end too. Top stuff.

[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

this week on 100 Films

No new reviews this week -- but a load of posts nonetheless, because the start of 2014 means it's time to look back on the seventh year of 100 Films in a Year!

As ever, multiple posts make up my review of the year just passed; and as per last year, there are now four of them. So in order we have:


2013 in Review, Part 1

WordPress have produced my annual report... Once you’ve read that, the following will make sense: It wasn’t just new posts that grew the archive of the blog: 141 reposts from 2007-2011 helped increase the tally from last year’s 249.

Read more here.


December 2013

Having set out with the goal of watching one super-acclaimed film per month, I somehow ended up with three to get through come December. That didn’t quite go to plan then. Undeterred, I shall be attempting this again in 2014… even though I wound up only seeing 11 of the 12 films I was supposed to. So what were the final two? Well...

Read more here.


2013: The Full List

Containing:
2013 As It Happened — links to 2013’s monthly updates, with the chronological list of my viewing;
The List — the full alphabetical list of my viewing;
The Statistics — where I really overanalyse what I’ve watched

Read more here.


2013 In Retrospect

With 2013 completed, listed, and analysed, all that remains is a final bit of reflection: of the 110 films I watched, which were the best? Which were the worst? And what new releases did I miss? Plus, this year you can vote for your favourite of my top ten.

Read more here.


Oh, and I said there were no new reviews, but there was an archive one new to the new blog...


Wild at Heart (1990)

it’s filled with mannered performances that can seem cheaper than those in daytime soaps (I presume this is deliberate); characters and plot threads that meander off and seem pointless; plus it lacks the opaqueness that many seem to hold as the key worthy feature of Lynch’s work.

Read more here.


So that's 2013 done! Aside from the 20 reviews I still have to post, that is. Hopefully, more of them next Sunday.

TV

Celebrity Mastermind
2013-14 Episode 3 (of 10)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Elementary
2x10 Tremors

Friends
7x02 The One with Rachel's Book [4th or so watch]

Articles

How Netflix Reverse Engineered Hollywood
by Alexis C. Madrigal (from The Atlantic)

A long but fascinating article on the technology used at Netflix to predict exactly what sorts of films a user likes, to a degree so maddening that their computer probably knows you better than you know yourself.

Plus, the Perry Mason bit at the end is engrossingly bizarre.

Collection Count

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

After the big Christmas update last time, just one straggler from the very end of last year. We'll see if the next few weeks turn into a post-Christmas lull or a post-Christmas buy-up-everything-I-didn't-get fest.

Number of titles in collection: 1,645 [up 1]
Of which DVDs: 1,197 [no change]
Of which Blu-rays: 448 [up 1]

Number of discs in collection: 4,120 [up 1]
Number of films in collection: 1,773 [up 1]
Number of TV episodes in collection: 6,098 [no change]
Number of short films in collection: 406 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

Celebrity Mastermind
2013-14 Episode 2 (of 10)
Missed episode one. Oops.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Friends
7x01 The One with Monica's Thunder [4th or so watch]
We got the Friends Blu-rays for Christmas, and this is the point we've chosen to switch to them. It does look rather extraordinary -- the D is certainly H.

Yonderland
1x04 The Ultimate Prize

TV

Agatha Christie's Marple
6x03 Endless Night [season finale]
Well, I found that to be a bit... slow. OK, by that I mean dull. It's not a Marple story originally, so she was somewhat shoehorned in; and the plot wasn't that engrossing -- there wasn't even a mystery until about an hour in! "Endless night" indeed.
There are rumours this will be the last-ever episode. Let's hope not. The post-millenial iteration of Miss Marple has never been up to the high standards of the Suchet Poirot, but it deserves more than this.
[Watch it (again) on ITV Player.]

QI
11x04 Knits & Knots (XL edition)

TV

Gangsta Granny
Every bit as good as last year's excellent Mr Stink. Keep the Walliams adaptations coming, I say!
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Mock the Week
12x13 Christmas Special
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Sherlock
3x01 The Empty Hearse
Well... hm.
Based on Twitter, some loved it and some hated it; others were just disappointed. I'm somewhere between all three. I thought it indulged too much in soap opera elements at times, letting character rule story; but it was largely funny and entertaining, and at times clever, so I can let some of the off bits slide. Not the series' best episode, by any means, but equally far from its worst.
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

TV

The Big Fat Quiz of the Year 2013
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Friends
6x23 The One with the Ring [4th or so watch]
6x24 The One with the Proposal Part 1 [5th or so watch]
6x25 The One with the Proposal Part 2 [season finale; 5th or so watch]

Hebburn
2x07 Sleep in Hebburnly Peace [Christmas special]
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

New Year's Eve Fireworks
Normally I like the fireworks, but this year I thought they were uninspired. Start as you mean to go on...?
(And the title's inaccurate, because the fireworks don't begin until midnight, making them New Year's Day Fireworks. Tsk.)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Films

Seven Samurai (1954)
[#110 in 100 Films in a Year 2013]

Second half (see yesterday).

TV

Arrow
2x09 Three Ghosts

Atlantis
1x12 Touched by the Gods Part One
1x13 Touched by the Gods Part Two [season finale]
Seems a shame a lot of people gave up on Atlantis so quickly -- it's grown into itself and become not bad. Considering Merlin had a similarly shaky start, this could well continue to improve if it's given the chance (which it will have in at least one more season).
[Watch Touched by the Gods Parts One & Two (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Friends
6x21 The One Where Ross Meets Elizabeth's Dad [4th or so watch]
6x22 The One Where Paul's the Man [5th or so watch]
Bruce Willis!

Never Mind the Buzzcocks
27x12 Buzzcocks: The Hunt for the Missing Episode - A Documentary with Krishnan Guru-Murthy

Films

Seven Samurai (1954)
[#110 in 100 Films in a Year 2013]

The first half thereof, anyway -- it's another long film with a handy intermission. I was aiming to watch it all in one go (which is demonstrably not impossible), but I was beginning to nod off before even the halfway point (no fault of the film), so it seemed daft to try to force through over 90+ minutes more. I'll watch that tomorrow.

TV

Death Comes to Pemberley
Part 3 (of 3)
Never read the novel, but I thought that was an engrossing and well-performed drama in its own right.
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Elementary
2x09 On the Line

Friends
6x19 The One with Joey's Fridge [4th or so watch]
6x20 The One with Mac and C.H.E.E.S.E. [5th or so watch]
Clips shows are clips shows... but Friends clips shows are a cut above the average. I mean, The One with Mac and C.H.E.E.S.E. has a proper storyline through it -- one I remember well and had forgotten was bolstered with all those montages. And actually, they're pretty good montages.

Have I Got News For You
46x10 (13/12/2013 edition; extended repeat)
The last proper episode -- #11 is a highlights show that I shan't bother with (but the extended version is still on iPlayer if you want).

Hebburn
2x06 Gas and Air [season finale]
Felt like a series finale... but there's a Christmas special to come, at least.
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

this week on 100 Films

With Christmas been and gone, the 100 Films Advent Calendar has to come to a close for another year. But if you've not been keeping up daily, that means there's still three new reviews for you to read...


Arthur Christmas (2011)

a breathless global knockabout — it rattles along so fast, an hour in you’ll think it must be nearly over. Aside from a few longueurs that give you pause to think such thoughts, it’s an entertaining ride, perfect for the family at Christmas.

Read more here.


Kick-Ass 2 (2013)

Kick-Ass joins up with a superhero team trying to do good, the M***********r gradually assembles his own team of villains, and Mindy tries to fit in as a regular high school girl... Whereas the first film riffed on archetypal characters and plots from regular superhero movies, as such providing an entertaining deconstruction of the genre, the sequel doesn’t feel as focussed.

Read more here.


Wreck-It Ralph (2012)

Unfortunately, despite the rarely-filmed milieu of video games, it’s all a bit predictable — it basically does with video game characters what Toy Story did with toys, both in terms of the story and its themes of acceptance.

Read more here.


Plus, one new to the new blog...


Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides [3D] (2011)

The film burns through ideas and plot points at a rate of knots. While I’m all for not stretching ideas thin, here the opposite is true, with not enough time devoted to explaining things, to characterisation, to making us give a damn about what’s going on or why it’s going on.

Read more here.


With 2013 nearly at a close, I'll be sharing my usual series of wrap-up articles soon. Keep an eye on 100 Films for that, or check back here for more next Sunday.

TV

Death Comes to Pemberley
Part 2 (of 3)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Friends
6x17 The One with Unagi [5th or so watch]
6x18 The One Where Ross Dates a Student [5th or so watch]
Or, The One with Joey's Twin ("How you dooo-iiin!"), and... no, the second one's good.

Not Going Out
7x01 The House [Christmas special]
Weird for a one-off Christmas special to be the first episode of a series that isn't immediately following it (because it's a one-off, innit). But that's what the episode guide says, so there you go. Either way, I thought it was good fun, and suitably Christmassy in that ghost story tradition... with plenty of laughs too, of course.
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Vicious
2x00 Christmas Special
More laughs! It may be a little blunt and old fashioned, but I like Vicious.
[Watch it (again) on ITV Player.]

Collection Count

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

This week's update includes my Christmas haul, which this year contained just four Blu-rays... and as one of them replaces three I already had, and the another upgrades (and expands) on a DVD I had, some of the changes look even more sedate. And others look huge, because one of those was a 25-film box set.

(Also this week, I noticed that I accidentally wiped out Damages -- I added it correctly here, but on the next update must have mucked up copying & pasting and 'lost' the disc and episode numbers. Rather than go back and correct three previous updates, I've just re-added them here. If I get bored later I may fix them after all and remove this paragraph, we'll see.)

Plus, this is the final update of the year! See how much my collection has grown in the last 12 months too...

Number of titles in collection: 1,644 [no change this week; up 123 in 2013]
Of which DVDs: 1,197 [down 1 this week; up 51 in 2013]
Of which Blu-rays: 447 [up 1 this week; up 72 in 2013]

Number of discs in collection: 4,119 [up 40 this week; up 285 in 2013]
Number of films in collection: 1,772 [up 23 this week; up 172 in 2013]
Number of TV episodes in collection: 6,098 [up 46 this week; up 398 in 2013]
Number of short films in collection: 406 [no change this week; up 32 in 2013]

Plus the year-end running time update...

Total running time of collection (approx.):
295 days, 18 hours, and 50 minutes.

(Up 1 day, 23 hours, and 20 minutes from last month.)
(Up 18 days, 23 hours, and 53 minutes from last year.)

See you next year, faithful reader!

TV

Hebburn
2x05 Stairway to Hebburn
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Miranda
3x03 The Dinner Party [2nd watch]
I'd forgotten this series of Miranda was only on at the start of this year -- feels much longer ago. Anyway, great episode.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Would I Lie To You?
7x10 At Christmas [special; 2nd watch]
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

TV

Death Comes to Pemberley
Part 1 (of 3)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Paul O'Grady: For the Love of Dogs
at Christmas [2013]
[Watch it (again) on ITV Player.]

Still Open All Hours
[2nd half]
Turned it on halfway through; won't be bothering to go back for the first half.
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Films

Star Wars - Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999)
[2nd half; 3rd or so watch]

Turned this on as something easy to watch. Ought to re-watch the whole saga at some point really...