TV

Adam Hills Stands Up Live
Absolutely hilarious, and nice to see a one-person stand-up on TV that isn't an edited version of a year-old DVD release. Heard some of the stories before in various other places, but they're still hilarious and there was new stuff too. Grand.
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Merlin
5x12 The Diamond of the Day Part One
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Never Mind the Buzzcocks
26x12 Touching People
The regular slightly-alternative best-of-the-series. Next week (which was actually on tonight), a Christmas special. Hurrah!
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Stephen Fry: Gadget Man
1x05 Body Beautiful
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Collection Count

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

Two weeks ago I said there'd be nothing between then and the post-Christmas update (which is next week, fact-fans). Turns out I'm a great big liar, because not only was there something last week, there's a bit more this week too.

In my defence, I thought these things (all imported from America) were going to turn up next week. But hey ho, what can you do? Amazingly fast Christmastime post it is!

Number of titles in collection: 1,516 [up 2]
Of which DVDs: 1,146 [down 1]
Of which Blu-rays: 370 [up 3]

Number of discs in collection: 3,798 [up 2]
Number of films in collection: 1,586 [up 2]
Number of TV episodes in collection: 5,700 [no change]
Number of short films in collection: 373 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader, for a running time-containing Christmas-fuelled update.

TV

The Graham Norton Show
12x08 (14/12/12 edition) [2nd watch]
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Merlin
5x11 The Drawing of the Dark
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

QI
10x13 Jobs (XL edition)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

I've been away. There's an awful lot of catching up to do. Here's a small fraction of it...

Castle
2x21 Den of Thieves
[Watch it (again) on Demand 5.]

Live at the Apollo
8x04 Episode 4
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

The Mentalist
5x07 If It Bleeds, It Leads
A new on-going plot? Did we really need one of those? And I swear the Red John story took a jump -- I felt like I'd missed an episode. I appreciate it when series don't treat their viewers like idiots, but every once in a while a helpful nudge of how things got where they are is also appreciated.
[Watch it (again) on Demand 5.]

Spy
2x09 Codename: Pulp Friction

TV

Bring Me Morecambe & Wise
1x04 The Plays Wot Ernie Wrote
These were always my favourite part of Morecambe & Wise, so this episode was a particular delight.

The British Comedy Awards 2012
Last year, they found a Harry Hill clip that actually made me laugh. This year, it was a Leigh Francis one. What's the world coming to?
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

this week on 100 Films

I'm still working my way along the 100 Films Advent Calendar, so there's another seven new reviews this week...


The Call of Cthulhu (2005)

The marriage of low-budget and silent film style is one made in heaven, particularly when you add in the dedication of the makers. They built impressive props, ingenious sets, and employed model work in various inventive ways, all to execute a story that includes a cultist swamp orgy, a mysterious island, a sea battle, and a skyscraper-sized monster.

Read more here.


Drive Angry (2011)

It’s got a crazy plot, crazy action, gratuitous violence, gratuitous nudity, rough production values, variable acting, loopy bad guys — the highlight is definitely the latter, with William Fichtner channelling Christopher Walken. The whole thing could do with being punchier and pacier, and shorter

Read more here.


Fantastic Four (2005)

this incarnation of the FF doesn’t really have a story. They kind of meander through a few things that Happen, then a villain finally emerges and they defeat him. It leaves the film bereft of narrative drive; a series of scenes strung together without a common goal.

Read more here.


The Final Destination (2009)

None of the deaths matter because nothing is done to make us care about these characters, or even be broadly interested in them, unlike the best of the earlier entries. So there's zero tension, zero emotion, just elaborate death after elaborate death. It's one of the most hollow films I can think of.

Read more here.


The Lincoln Lawyer (2011)

it’s a solid crime/legal thriller; the kind of thing we’d probably get as a 90-minute TV episode over here, but thanks to America not really having that format, it gets the cinema treatment. Nonetheless, it’s well enough acted, with an interesting enough story, to sustain the grander status automatically afforded to something released theatrically.

Read more here.


Passchendaele (2008)

Despite winning a bunch of Canadian film awards, this First World War drama seems to have been really poorly received by critics — the Radio Times even saw fit to award it just 1 star! I must dissent, however, because I thought it was very good.

Read more here.


Tiny Furniture (2010)

Tiny Furniture comes with a predisposition to dislike it from anyone who isn’t a hipster or desperate to be relevant to hipsters... It’s a slow-paced, consciously arthouse-drama-y story film about unlikeable people leading unlikeable lives. I think everyone in it is either selfish or at least self-centred.

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

TV

The Graham Norton Show
12x08 (14/12/12 edition)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

QI
10x13 Jobs
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Collection Count

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

Despite my assertion last week, I can't resist a bargain, and getting The Hammer Collection box set for what equates to 89p per film definitely counts as a bargain in my book. But that really is it until after Christmas now.

Probably.

Number of titles in collection: 1,514 [up 1]
Of which DVDs: 1,147 [up 1]
Of which Blu-rays: 367 [no change]

Number of discs in collection: 3,796 [up 21]
Number of films in collection: 1,584 [up 21]
Number of TV episodes in collection: 5,700 [no change]
Number of short films in collection: 373 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

The Graham Norton Show
12x07 (7/12/12 edition)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Have I Got News For You
44x09 (14/12/12 edition)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Stephen Fry: Gadget Man
1x04 Fun and Games
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

TV

1001 Things You Should Know
1x20 (7/12/12 edition)
[Watch episodes it (again) on 4oD.]

Have I Got News For You
44x08 (7/12/12 edition; extended repeat)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Never Mind the Buzzcocks
26x11 Episode 11
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

TV

Bring Me Morecambe & Wise
1x03 At Home with Eric and Ern

Castle
2x20 The Late Shaft
[Watch it (again) on Demand 5.]

John Bishop's Big Year
Episode 2 (of 2)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Spy
2x08 Codename: Double Oh

TV

1001 Things You Should Know
1x17 (4/12/12 edition)
1x18 (5/12/12 edition)
[Watch episodes 17 and 18 (again) on 4oD.]

The Mentalist
5x06 Cherry Picked
[Watch it (again) on Demand 5.]

QI
10x11 Jumpers (XL edition)

Articles

Creating The IDW Covers: Judge Dredd Year One
by Dave Sim (from A Moment of Cerebus)

Interesting piece on the thought and work that goes into creating a comic's cover.

TV

Have I Got News For You
44x07 (30/11/12 edition; extended repeat)

Never Mind the Buzzcocks
26x10 Episode 10
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

The Royal Variety Performance 2012
Now, I thought this switched between the Beeb and ITV every year, but it was on ITV last year and again this year, so... Well, it doesn't matter; just baffled me slightly.
[Watch it (again) on ITV Player.]

Stephen Fry: Gadget Man
1x03 Work Made Easy
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Articles

Skyfall blows past Spider-Man 3 to become Sony's top-grossing film
(from HitFix)

Records are falling before it like flies and its placing in various charts is constantly on the rise. Where will it stop? Nobody knows!

Comics

The Amazing Spider-Man #699 by Dan Slott & Humberto Ramos

Explanations! Great if you've been reading ASM for years, I'm sure, but it's a little thumb-twiddly otherwise -- it's all prelude to whatever's coming next issue.


Extermination #3 & #4 by Simon Spurrier, Jeffrey Edwards & V Ken Marion

This is such fun, especially if you're a fan of Batman and/or Superman, which two of the main characters are delightfully unsubtle riffs on. Which is fine, because you could never do this in a licensed story. It's also generally witty and clever too, even if the art is occasionally scruffy.


Revival #3 by Tim Seeley & Mike Norton

Continues to slow burn, but still great.

this week on 100 Films

The 100 Films Advent Calendar continues apace, with seven new reviews published to 100 Films in a Year this week...


Chatroom (2010)

Chatroom is born of trying to find a viable way of depicting the world of online chatrooms on film... presumably presenting the online world in a filmic way was a necessary aside for wanting to set a story in that world. Sadly, the actual tale being told isn’t up to all that much.

Read more here.


The Expendables (2010)

What you do get is a film that revels in its action-movie-ness. I mean, most of the characters have great (read: daft) action movie names: Barney Ross, Lee Christmas, Yin Yang, Toll Road, Hale Caesar, Paine… How is that not a film aware of its own absurdity? How can you not enjoy that, even a little?

Read more here.


The Keep (1983)

it’s really good; a film that is genuinely creepy, with an effective sense of foreboding and mystery… for about half an hour or so. [...] Events become convoluted and borderline nonsensical, and whatever thematic points the film has to make about evil and belief get lost in the mix.

Read more here.


The Last Airbender (2010)

The plot pings back and forth between locations and characters, basing itself in a heavy mythology that isn’t adequately explained. Chunks of it seem to be missing, conveyed through clunky voiceover rather than on-screen action. The first rule of screenwriting is Show Don’t Tell, but Shyamalan does exactly the opposite.

Read more here.


M (British version) (1931/1932)

Let’s establish one thing right away: this is unquestionably an inferior version of Fritz Lang’s masterpiece, M. Never mind that it’s an old, unrestored, thoroughly battered print; it’s the conscious changes that — unavoidably — lessen the film.

Read more here.


Predators (2010)

it’s not an entirely stock plot merely peppered with gunfights. Rodriguez and co have made the effort to push the mythology in new directions; ones which seem to build naturally out of other Predator media, even though those aren’t specifically mentioned.

Read more here.


The Sum of All Fears (2002)

it’s a solid little thriller. A bit plodding at times, but engrossing enough... There’s A Big Twist in the middle that would easily have been one of the best bits about the film, had they not blown it in the trailers. Even still, it’s a bit audacious

Read more here.


If that wasn't enough, also new to the new blog were...


Predator (1987)

Let’s not pretend here: although the series have become intrinsically linked, Predator is Alien’s poorer cousin. Not that it’s a bad film — it’s an entertaining war flick that turns into a sci-fi/action/horror skirmish thingy — but it doesn’t have the same finesse that imbues Alien and its sequel.

Read more here.


Predator 2 (1990)

the action is moved from a jungle to the concrete jungle (see what they did there?) of LA... the vastly different settings and setups mean that, even with the involvement of the same sneaky alien hunter, the films have a vastly different feel too. It’s just a shame Predator 2’s “urban jungle” concept is so poorly executed

Read more here.


Another seven (hopefully!) next Sunday.

TV

Merlin
5x10 The Kindness of Strangers
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Films

The Expendables (2010)
[#94 in 100 Films in a Year 2012]

Comics

Dial H #3, #4 & #5 by China Miéville & Mateus Santolouco

Here's a funny one, then. After the fun of the first two issues, Dial H takes a sharp downward turn into confusing babble here. It builds back up to something that makes sense and a clever climax, but it's not really much fun until quite near the end. There's nothing wrong with making your reader work a bit -- not spoon-feeding them everything -- but this goes too far down the road of oblique mysteriousness for the sake of it, giving us multiple characters who all know what they're babbling about while locking the reader out. And then, like I say, it does get a bit better. Now I'm torn between dropping this and keeping going.


Dial H #0 by China Miéville & Riccardo Burchielli

As for the Zero Issue, it tells a completely unrelated story that manages to illuminate the mythology of the dial, with some interesting revelations about how it works. Again, it trades on confusion until quite near the end, but at least in this instance the answers are actually in the same issue.


Extermination #2 by Simon Spurrier & Jeffrey Edwards

See below.


Revival #2 by Tim Seeley & Mike Norton

It's 6 months since I read Extermination #1, and though a bit foggy I did manage to pick it back up fine.

It's 4 months since I read Revival #1, and though I largely followed it I felt I really ought to re-read the first one to fully appreciate just what was going on.

I don't know what that says about each respective series, but they're both great. Extermination is bold, dark, but funny and entertaining, while Revival is more serious, grown-up and mysterious. And if the latter continues on its current path -- and retains its current levels of praise -- it's a dead cert for a Walking Dead-style cable TV series at some point, because that's exactly what it feels like. And I look forward to that.