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Pick of the day

Bonekickers

Posted by Remote Control on July 7, 2008 10:14 PM

You can always tell when the BBC is getting excited about a programme: Its stars start turning up all over the place.

Whenever there's a sniff of a new series of Spooks, the whole cast is wheeled out to do interviews all over the place: From Friday Night with Ross to the Chris Moyles Breakfast Show on Radio 1, there truly is no great machine geared up for self publicity than the BBC.

As so it's proved with Bonekickers, which seems a bit like a British Indiana Jones, but done by committee. Yet top marks to Simon Mayo who, on his telly preview segment on his daily Five Live show pretty much killed off any desire most of his listeners will have had about tuning in on Tuesday at 9pm.

Of the panel of three, no-one had anything good to say about it, all neatly summed up by the phrase "It's like Scooby Doo but without the detail." Oh dear. Part of the panel's problem also seemed to be the fact it was made by the creators of Life on Mars, and so they sought out, where they could, parallels in the characters. And from the writers of a sharp-tongued cop drama comes a sharp-tongued new drama. Fancy that.

This week's television treats

Posted by Remote Control on May 18, 2008 9:08 PM

It's that time of the week again - time to sit in front of the Sky+ box and make sure all the televisual highlights over the next seven days get recorded. No excuses now, not even the fact the sun is shining gives you a get out for missing these programmes....

Picks of the week

Posted by Remote Control on April 13, 2008 6:52 PM

For the first time in quite a while, I'm looking forward to several programmes on telly this week. One thing is for sure, the Sky+ will be rather busy ensuring the new arrivals this week are safely recorded for future viewing.

Here are my picks of the week:

To buy or not to buy. Most times, they choose not

Posted by Remote Control on April 2, 2008 4:42 PM

There are probably many reasons why the return of Ricky Butcher to Eastenders is good news.

He is a good actor. The soap does need a few more realistic characters (though the fact Bianca is returning may kick that into touch). And it needs to have a plot which doesn't involve a character with the surname Slater.

Spooks is back. Sort of

Posted by Remote Control on March 30, 2008 10:59 PM

For fans of Spooks from the start, the last series was, to say the least, a bit disappointing.

The switch from self-contained episodes to one long plot (Britain v Iran) was ok, but when you compare it with the opening couples of series, you soon realise it's gone off the boil a bit.

Uh-oh. The Apprentice is back

Posted by Remote Control on March 21, 2008 4:18 PM

I was in London earlier this week, and in all of those newspapers the rather demented yet brightly-coloured folk push into your hands whenever you approach a train station, people were writing about the return of The Apprentice.


Dancing on Ice: The Skate Off

Posted by Remote Control on March 15, 2008 4:47 PM

ADMITTEDLY, it's not on a par with accepting you have a problem with alcohol, or announcing that you're sleeping with your girlfriend's mother (neither of which I have any experience of) but it's painful to have to say it anyway: I've rather enjoyed Dancing On Ice.

I'm sure somewhere, back in the early archives of the blog, you'll find me letting rip about it being yet another crap, celebrity-fuelled waste of broadcasting time. I admit it, I was wrong. My opposition and general apathy towards celebrity sing-offs, dance-offs, dress-ups and wife-swaps still stands. But Dancing On Ice is the exception.

And it's Chris Fountain that's done it for me. Teenage girls have swooned for him and middle-aged women have talked about mothering him, but, for me, he's proof that Dancing On Ice is perhaps the one celebrity programme (Big Brother included) where celebrities are taken totally from their comfort zone and exposed if they don't try hard.

Rentaghost for the 21st century

Posted by Remote Control on February 17, 2008 5:02 PM

Something seems amiss with the BBC3 schedules at the moment - there's a distinct lack of Two Pints of Lager and Packet of Crisps at present.

Still, some of the new shows coming through as the channel tries to grow up a bit are worth checking out - like Being Human (BBC 3, 9pm), a one-off drama (or as one-off as a drama which is repeated three hours after it premieres can be) which is one of six the BBC have lined up for the next few weeks.

Neighbours - on Five

Posted by Remote Control on February 10, 2008 5:23 PM

FORGET the advent of colour telly, the arrival of Channel four, the launch of BskyB or indeed digital television – the biggest thing to rock our increasingly square eyes happens today. At 1.45pm to be precise.

Neighbours moves to Channel 5. Now admittedly, tongue was firmly in cheek when writing the previous paragraph, but there is no doubting that the decision by Channel 5 to bid very highly for Neighbours, the Aussie soap we all grew up with, suggested that they felt the Beeb wasn’t getting the most out of it.


Jerry, Jerry, Jerry....

Posted by Remote Control on January 29, 2008 11:40 PM

AS a champion of all things confrontational and humiliating on TV (hello Jeremy Kyle), I'm pleased to announced that I've stumbled across something which takes the whole tell-all-in-front-of-the-cameras-and-your-wife genre to a new level.

And perhaps it won't be a massive surprise to be told that the host is Jerry Springer.

Russell Brand and Paul Merton

Posted by Remote Control on January 25, 2008 5:44 PM

Perhaps it's the power of this blog. Or the ability of this blog to state the bloody obvious when it comes to bemoaning what's lacking in the TV schedules.

Having berated how poor the comedy offering on TV is - I even found myself laughing at My Family the other night - there's actually some good, 'live' comedy starting to finally creep into the schedules.

New year, new you, New Zealand

Posted by Remote Control on January 13, 2008 5:25 PM

NEW YEAR, new you. How many hours of TV are currently being filled with programmes which make out they are trying to help us improve our lives, or change our lives forever?

From what I can see though, only one programme truly delivers on that score. And it's on at 9.15am for the next fortnight.

Car Crash Band Aid

Posted by Remote Control on January 12, 2008 1:36 PM

Any regular reader of this blog will know what I think of reality TV talent contests: they're good for one thing - humiliaying the deluded. And as such, the early programmes are normally the best - the auditions.

The One and Only (BBC 1, 6.25pm and 9.20pm tonight), however, is going to be must-see TV all the way through. It's basically X-Factor for amateur tribute acts. The prize is top class - a three month contract in the tribute act capital of the world (Las Vegas, not Liverpool during the Mathew Street festival)But by the very nature of the competition, you get people who take being a lookie-likey so seriously that it can only be amusing. Sadly, the BBC has opted not to go for overkill on this reality show, and compacted the selection process into two shows last Saturday night. Even that was a treat. Instead of having publicity-seeking personality judges picking which tribute acts should go through to the main competition, they got super fans.