TV

Dragons' Den
7x03 Episode 3
Someone who goes to my Uni! Whoo!
Otherwise, not the most exciting episode.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

8 Out of 10 Cats
8x08 Best Bits [season finale]
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Desperate Romantics
Part 1 (of 6)
Desperate Romantics has come in for some criticism over its historical accuracy, but I found it to be rather fun.
Incidentally, the BBC's series website is actually worth checking out for once -- unlike most series, there's actually content there beyond press release episode summaries and iPlayer links.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Wildest Dreams
Part 1 (of 7)
Ah Nick Knowles, never knowingly saying something that isn't a cliche stating the bleedin' obvious. As for the series, it has a good heart -- helping wannabes become wildlife cameraman -- but is actually a huge con -- the prize, according to a recent Radio Times, is actually a much more lowly job in the BBC's wildlife department. So the contestants go through all this hardship to become something like a runner? Makes you feel kinda sorry for them...
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Articles

Cox 'asked Fincher for directing advice' by Lara Martin
(from Digital Spy)
"Former Friends star Courteney Cox has revealed that she turned to Fight Club filmmaker David Fincher for advice about making her directorial debut."
Well, he did appear in an episode of (the underrated) Dirt, maybe he exec produced it as well or somesuch (I could look it up to find out, but I won't).

Jon Favreau 'confirms Iron Man 3' by Tim Parks
(from Digital Spy)
"He said: "There's an Iron Man 3. Here's how I know. When they make the option deals, they include Iron Man 3. So I know they're planning on 3.""
What non-news! I can't really believe Favreau really thinks optioning your cast & crew for future potential films confirms a franchise. Of course, only the second one flopping at the box office would keep it from happening, and that's not likely, but still...

Review: Watchmen Director’s Cut
(from WatchmenComicMovie.com)
Good coverage of the extended cut, and a relatively complete list of its changes can be found here. My Blu-ray copy is still making its way to me from Amazon US.

Tom Felton rejection 'really upsets' fan by Daniel Kilkelly
(from Digital Spy)
Headline makes it sound mean; truth is, fan was a bit loopy. Ah fans, you are a mad lot.

Wogan backs Norton at Eurovision
(from BBC News)
A tiny aside in the new Radio Times prompted this, BBC News' #1 entertainment story for some of today. Madness. Still, Norton was very good.

TV

Crip on a Trip
This is one of those Channel 4 documentaries that has a mildly offensive/outrageous title but hides a programme with some genuine worth and serious thought. Not normally the kind of thing I bother with, to be honest, but I happened to see the start of a repeat on teachers.tv and became engrossed.
[Watch it (again) on teachers.tv or 4oD.]

Doctor Who: The Waters of Mars Trailer
The San Diego Comic-Con trailer, as mentioned in the panel reports. Looks fantastic.

Films

Dorian Gray Trailer
Trailer for the forthcoming film adaptation starring Ben Barnes, Colin Firth, and others (obviously, but I mean some notable others). The link above goes to an Empire article that provides a teeny bit of analysis and links on to the trailer at a different site.

Articles

Doctor Who And The End Of Time: Tennant's Last Moments by Charlie Jane Anders
(from io9)
Firstly, The Waters of Mars: yes, yes, yes! After setting up the concept of "some things must not be changed" to explain why the Doctor didn't just save everyone in The Fires of Pompeii, doing the same in a future-set episode is officially the new Best Idea Ever. Well done Russell & co for thinking of it -- it seems so obvious, yet I bet didn't occur to most people.
Anyway, this report includes more details on the trailers shown, and a few more bits of info on the Who panel... but hardly anything more than the weak article I found yesterday, so I'm led to assume there was really nothing to report. Ho hum.

Oh wait, what's this? A more thorough report. Yes indeed...

Live: Doctor Who panel at Comic-Con by Neil Wilkes
(from Digital Spy)
Ah, right, nothing else news-y. Fans may wish to wade through the writer's irritating lack of Who knowledge (despite the fact he thinks he knows a lot, clearly) for the info present. Only news on Torchwood 4 is that it's not confirmed but is likely, etc etc.

Talking of Torchwood, what's this?

Live: Torchwood panel at Comic-Con by Neil Wilkes
(from Digital Spy)
Thanks to a series recently airing, there's a bit more to this panel than the Who one, though still little in the way of news. Probably the best bit: "RTD says he is "still reeling" from the success of [Children of Earth] and says no-one at the BBC saw it coming." Super.
Actually, even better: "Girl claims that RTD has "hurt" a lot of internet fans and accuses him of being "out of line" with killing Ianto. "I'm immensely sorry if people are sad, but I'm not changing my mind. I've got to be blunt about this, there have been campaigns to send packets of coffee to BBC Wales in protest. There have been nine packets sent. I'm not taking the mickey, but that's a very small number."" You tell 'em Russell!

Also from the Con...

Are You Ready For The Avatar Backlash? by Charlie Jane Anders
(from io9)
Remember what I said about Avatar not sounding that great? Well...

And on a final, related (not to Avatar, to Torchwood) note...

Torchwood Children Of Earth Soundtrack review by Cameron K McEwan
(from Den of Geek!)
I've not changed my opinion that Den of Geek is rubbish (because it is), but this review is worth reading purely for this comment:

The Ballad Of Ianto Jones [is] one of the album's highlights. Though ‘highlights' does not quite do it service or meaning. It's more of a ‘low'light in tone and emotion. Not a tune for those emotionally unstable 'fans' that can't handle drama.

Nice dig! I approve.

TV

Grand Designs
8x04 Monmouth: The Gothic House
I do like a bit of Grand Designs, though most of the houses built -- despite supposedly being highly personalised -- are rather samey. Not so here, however, as a couple create a brilliant faux-Gothic mansion. Right up my street. Though going over budget by a whopping £150,000 -- in this case, that's 60%! -- is just insane.

Articles

As ever at this time of year, lots from the all-dominating San Diego Comic-Con. But first, we'll have all that's Doctor Who-y from it...

Doctor Who, David Tennant and The End Of Time by Glenn Hauman
(from ComicM!x)
The main panel, hurrah! Not much in this report though -- no mention of any of the things covered by the following, for example. I shall now hunt the net for something more thorough...

David Tennant Tells Us Why His Doctor's So Sorry, And What's To Come by Charlie Jane Anders
(from io9)
Despite the main panel (see above), this press pre-interview has a couple of revelations. Or non-revelations, really (there won't be a movie).

Torchwood picked up for another season by BBC by Glenn Hauman
(from ComicM!x)
Allegedly -- no mention of it in that panel report above. That said, it wasn't very thorough, so who knows? As it's from the same site (and the same reporter), maybe they assumed people would just trust that they'd already said it? (Which would be foolish, but hey, sites are like that.)

Doctor Who Vs Predator by James Dyer
(from Amazing Tales from Comic-Con! at Empire)
A silly little bit, courtesy of Empire.

And in other, genuinely comic-related con news...

Marvel Announces The Avengers' Line-Up, Plus Thor And Captain America News by Meredith Woerner
(from io9)
A pared back line-up for the film of The Avengers comic, it would seem, sticking to those with already-established (or about-to-be-established) film franchises.

Tony Stark's On The Firing Line In First Iron Man 2 Footage! by Lauren Davis
(from io9)
Unsurprisingly, one of the big stars of Comic-Con is Iron Man 2. Plenty of reports around the web, but this one describes the footage seen in good detail.

TV

As Seen on TV
1x02 Episode 2
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Outnumbered
2x02 Episode 2 [2nd watch]
I stumbled across this repeat tonight just a few minutes in and couldn't help but watch the rest -- it's brilliant.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Alice in Wonderland Trailer
Tim Burton directing Alice in Wonderland? It is, as they say, a "no brainer", and looks pretty much exactly as you'd expect it to... but in a good way.

Articles

First:

WWI veteran Patch dies aged 111
(from BBC News)
"The last British survivor of the World War I trenches, Harry Patch, has died at the age of 111."
Appropriately, the main story across BBC News today.

Now, on to more trivial matters...

A Night With Peter Jackson by Nick de Semlyen
(from Amazing Tales from Comic Con! at Empire)
In which the director reveals all a little about the many, many projects he has in development.

Panel Report: Avatar by James Dyer
(from Amazing Tales from Comic Con! at Empire)
It's amazing, blah blah blah. I can only assume it looked a lot better than it actually sounds.

Spies like them by Gordon Corera
(from BBC News Magazine)
"What do real life spooks make of fictional spies?"
A simple but incredibly interesting concept for an article, which is moderately well-served here. It would be more interesting to know what spies thought of purportedly realistic series like Spooks (well, in its early series) or the too-forgotten Sandbaggers, rather than the obviously-fictional world of James Bond. Perhaps the three-part radio series it's promoting will shed more light on the matter.

Blogger Search

Is it just me, or has Blogger's search function turned into a load of old rubbish?

Try searching this blog for Spooks, for just one example. I've seen all of Spooks, in order, so that includes all of season six and season seven... but when you search for it, the top result is the TV post from 24th October 2008, when I watched episode four and five (of ten) of Spooks 6. Well, that's clearly not right.

Scroll further, and you see that Blogger hasn't forgotten all posts since then for some bizarre reason. The next post showing on the search results is from 25th August 2008 -- season five, episode five! It's lost a whole series in between too!

Or so it seems, for while the third post displayed is from June 2008, the fourth then jumps back to July, and the sixth finally makes it into 2009... for an episode of The Sandbaggers where I mention Spooks.

I presume search is now based on some 'relevance' order rather than the old chronological system, which is a huge annoyance for a blog like this. (Also, how it determines relevance is entirely unclear. While some of the top results do mention Spooks by name several times, others only say it once, yet are still out of order.)

It would be nice if there were some kind of setting to change how search results were displayed -- especially by default, but even at all would be nice -- but it seems no one's thought to include this. Not even the supposedly swish new Search Box gadget helps (I know, I've tried adding it -- look there on the right).

This has rather annoyed me, as you may be able to tell. So what have I done about it?

Well, um, I've moaned about it on my blog, of course...

Edit: This issue is, of course, widespread. After a lot of moaning that went unanswered, someone from Google finally responded (scroll down that thread)... with a "we're working on it" claim. Well, we'll see...

TV

FlashForward Trailer
I'd vaguely heard of this before, but didn't realise it was being pitched as such a Big Thing until now. It certainly looks mystery-packed and promising, and one can only hope it lives up to the hype, but the real question is: will the main story be solved in one season a la Heroes, or far too many, a la Lost? Only time (or, y'know, a decent creator interview) will tell.
(Incidentally, it's just been announced that in the UK it will air on Five and its associate channels.)

Mock the Week
7x03 (23/7/09 edition)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Taking the Flak
1x01 Bigfooting
A strong start for this African-set war-based news sitcom, which seems to have been buried in the schedules for no good reason. That said, perhaps trimming this hour-long opener down to the regular length of 30 minutes might've kept the joke-rate higher. Nonetheless, a lot of promise, so fingers crossed it can deliver.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Poem of the Week: A Clubman's Ozymandias

by Kit Wright

Back when Watchmen hit cinemas I posted two vaguelly related poems about Ozymandias, the famous one by Percy Bysshe Shelley and a lesser-known one by his friend Horace Smith.

Well, next Monday sees Watchmen released on DVD and Blu-ray here in the UK (some lucky pre-ordering people will already have their copies), plus it was out earlier this week in the US, so here's an even-more-tenuously linked poem: Kit Wright's take on the Shelley poem.

So this chap tells this other chap
Some damned clap-trap
About how somewhere on the old map
He's seen these de-bagged legs, and to cap
It all, not a scrap
On top of them, bugger all on tap
But the desert sands and similar pap --
Just a bloody great gap --

This was first published in 1989 in Wright's collection Short Afternoons. It's currently available in Hoping It Might Be So: Poems 1974-2000, a collection of all Wright’s work for adults in that period, published by Faber Finds.

TV

As Seen on TV
1x01 Episode 1
It's funny that two TV-related quiz shows should start up so close together. While this isn't as funny as You Have Been Watching (see further down), it is more of a quiz, which increases the play-along-at-home factor. I also thought a lot of it was very easy... but maybe that just means I watch too much TV...
As a side note, it felt quite at home on a Friday, but from episode two has moved to Thursdays. Why? (I appreciate the extreme irony in saying this having watched it on a Thursday.)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Dragons' Den
7x02 Episode 2
Another excellent, unusual finale for the second week in a row -- not to mention the poker player earlier in the episode -- suggests this is shaping up to be a very good series.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

The Mentalist
1x16 Bloodshot
A new episode was on tonight, but I'm still a few weeks behind playing catch-up. An episode with a lot of potential here, and some relatively important moments in the series' ongoing subplots, but some ideas (the blindness, taking hostages inside the CBI) still felt a little wasted.
[Watch it (again) on Demand Five.]

You Have Been Watching
1x03 (21/7/09 edition)
Brilliant brilliant brilliant. If you haven't already, watch it.
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

TV

Dara O Briain Talks Funny: Live in London [TV version; 2nd half]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Articles

Review of Watchmen: Director's Cut - BD by Mike Restaino
(from DVDFile)
DVDFile's reviews are pretty awful on the whole (poorly written and edited, and I seem to very rarely agree with their opinions), but this gives a nice indication of how good the disc's image, audio and extras are. On the other hand, I suppose I should really go find a review by a decent site. Oh, like...

Review of Watchmen - Director's Cut [Blu-ray] by Gary Tooze
(from DVD Beaver)
Much better. And also, this one:

Review of Watchmen Blu-ray by Kenneth Brown
(from Blu-ray.com)
Ah, the best, most thorough one yet. That should do it.

TV

Dara O Briain Talks Funny: Live in London [TV version; 1st half]
The first thing I've properly watched on BBC HD in my new place... and recorded too. Rather surprised, and somewhat pleased, to discover that because I've got my Surround Sound system hooked up to my V+ box it forces me to use it (it doesn't send any sound whatsoever to the telly), which is a very handy and obvious reminder to turn it all on and receive the extra quality.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

8 Out of 10 Cats
8x07 Best of British Special
Something a little different for Cats (though they did a Movie Special earlier this series, which I annoyingly missed).

The Mentalist
1x15 Scarlett Fever
A relatively slight episode, though a couple of scenes did stand out.
[Watch it (again) on Demand Five.]

Articles

His time has come: New Doctor Who Matt Smith begins filming with his gorgeous young redheaded assistant by Daily Mail Reporter
(from Mail Online)
Well, the headline tells most of the story, but the pictures also give our first glimpse at his costume. They seem to be going for the Old Man In A Young Body thing, which is probably for the best. Only eight or so months til these episodes start airing...