These are just a couple of Random Picks for Programs that are must watches on BBC iPlayer in the Coming Days and most of all over the Christmas Period (Click to Watch), Available Until Dates and Times from time of publishing, likely to change due to repeats:
I picked up this latest Christmas one-off piece of TV, on BBC iPlayer, it was hid in the schedules at 10pm, Thursday 18th Decmeber on BBC Four, but am I glad I watched it. It is based around Owen, his family, his Dad's Brothers and his cousin, set on 3 separate Christmas Eve and Days, 1983, 86 and 89. It plays on the recurring aspects of Christmas, the change from each Christmas to the next and strangely uses dramatic irony (google it) very well. It was written by Mark Watson and inspired by a Dylan Thomas short story. And couldn't have been a better watch on a snow day here in the UK.
Owen is played fantastically by Oliver Bunyan ('83,'86) and Mark Williams ('89) but also the Narration by Michael Sheen (as Owen) brought the whole thing together for me, yes, Michael Sheen who has recently shot to fame thanks to The Queen, Frost-Nixon, and The Damned United among others. The simple comedy and comic-aspects of the program were great; I would have liked this if it was just a drama, but that hint just to push it over the edge really made it for me, and anyway thats what Christmas, let alone Christmas TV is all about.
Owen and Maurice (his cousin) don't say much in this comic drama, but I didn't mind that and when they did it was exactly what was needed. If these two where mute, it wouldn't be good, but the little speaking interaction they have is perfect, but in regards to Maurice's character having him practically as mute is due to other things around his character that become apparent. In Owen's case, Oliver Bunyan and later Mark Williams both play it perfectly to the narration, adding the physical and emotional aspect behind Michael Sheen's words. I have to say that I preferred Bunyan's Owen more, probably just because he was the one you saw for the first two parts of the story and he is the sort of age that you'd think that the looking back at Christmas childhood would be and not the older Owen, how looks anything between 15 and 19.
The Mother in this great piece of TV is played by Ruth Jones, of Gavin and Stacey fame as Nessa, I never would have known that if I hadn't looked it up, she looks incredibly different to the normal slob she plays on Gavin and Stacey, pure gold she was in this. The Father (Geraint) is has also been round the block for quite a while, Mark Lewis Jones. These two have great chemistry on screen and work perfectly with Owen as a family unit.
The more dysfunctional Uncle Gorwel, his the comedy card and is that crazy uncle that everyone has, I loved him, he's played by Paul Kaye, who I saw play a similarly (maybe even less) dysfunctional in Pulling, just last week. He is great comedy TV, the one you laugh at but can also have a bit of a laugh with.
The rich, fat and rather bitter Uncle Huw is played Steve Speirs, and it is so easy to hate him because is snobbish, rich to a degree (a Welsh degree) and a bit of a fun "sucker", come on it's Christmas! Always pushing his new technology down the throats of the rest of the family. On that note, I love the little references to differences in simple ways of living and technology and the like, for example: "All that walk and then he wasn't there... Why can't people have their own phones?... Why can't people just have a tiny little phone that you could fit in your pocket and take everywhere you go", after Owen and his Dad's trek to the phone box "up the hill" for a five second phone call to Gorwel.
I think that this is a must see this Christmas and also good family viewing if you want, and I still don't know why this was placed in this timeslot on this channel, no offense BBC Four, you're not exactly a ratings pull. But please give it a try this Christmas, you won't be disappointed.
To see this again, it will be on BBC One Wales at 6:10pm and on BBC Four at 7:15pm on Christmas Eve, and other times throughout the Festive Season (also available on BBC HD, check listing), or anytime in the next few weeks on BBC iPlayer.
It's a Saturday afternoon and therefore the TV offerings are minimalistic, to say the least. So I flicked over to the CBBC Channel (of all things), and was lucky enough to see the timeless stylings of the Chuckle Brothers and ChuckleVision which was a staple of my childhood, firstly because it never changed and never needed to be updated.
"To me, To you" might be a bit "old" but really who cares, it doesn't need to be the high definition, laser shooting, head ache that kids TV now days it seems to be. The series has been going from 1987, thats 6 years longer than I've been on this earth, and has had 21 series so far. The characters never get old and the innocent fun is something that I hope that my kids would be able to enjoy when their young, well they are getting into their mid-60s and they probably wont be around then, sorry boys.
Afterwards, Arthur came on, ah... the memories, great TV and it's not GI Joe or Hannah Montana! Then Dennis the Menace (or as it is now known Dennis and Gnasher), but not who I know it, with some teen pop-rock/scene theme tune. Its alien, the actual cartoon isn't the same as well, it looks modern (and not in a good way) and not how I want to remember it, they seem to have grown up in the cartoon, why? Even though the simple concept hasn't changed, I'm bitter and definitely prefer the other version (its slightly growing on me).
I've just done research on the new and old series, and with out even knowing it, the old series only ran for 2 series (from 1996-1998) yet I remember it being on forever, only 26 episodes. And the new series that started this year will include 52 episodes just in the first. I must have watched those first episodes over and over again without releasing it... good times, when you could watch the same episode over and over again and not worry or care. Come to think about it all the episodes are based around the same storyline everytime, yep... thats a child's brain for you. Original Dennis:
New Dennis:
I've just turned over to ITV1, where a new series of "All Star" Family Fortunes, which is a sort of show I would have liked when I was younger, but know I can see how absolutely rubbish it is. They aren't even families, this episode includes the cast of Heartbeat, when was that last on, half the people in that I reconised from Coronation Street, which I don't watch, even if it is the "Nation's favorite Street", anyway and the "ladies" of Loose Women, when did anyone with a job ever watch them? I'm already pissed off with this and it's not 10 minutes into the show.
Wait, that Coleen, that's the lady off the Iceland ad, ever since Kerry bottled and needed a side kick until Kerry totally let go, in more than one way.
Yeah, it might look nice and clean and modern every time there's a new series and there are the same sound effects that are recognizable throughout the nation, it's just old, old, old. I haven't watched the new Saturday night game show The Cube yet, but it looks good and fresh, that's what ITV need to be doing. Come on guys, it's older than anything else on TV, bring it back when we want some nostalgia not having it on month after month after month and it's never real people anymore (no matter if it's a real family or not), it's always celebrities, why? Yeah, they might be playing for charity, but what happens to those extra prizes that you can't really give to charities, those prizes were made for all the family to win, not random celebrities that no-one has heard of to win. And when they won the top prize, they couldn't afford real pyrotechnics, they just had pictures of fireworks going off. And now that ITV have copied the BBC iPlayer (even though no-one can get it as perfect, as BBC did, mostly because it doesn't have any ads), I can not watch the show again. That I didn't really want to watch first time; I just felt blog post coming on.
An answer, from one of Loose Women,"One thing that you might leave on when you leave the house?", answer gievn, "If your a man, your wives' shoes". What! All these women are massive air-heads and old, how is that possible? No, sorry that's ITV in a nut-shell. I prefer the old Family Fortunes, sorry Vernon you'll never do it for me.
The second series of Merlin hit our screens yesterday, and for me, along with Strictly Come Dancing kicking off this weekend, this marks the countdown to Christmas and some very good Saturday Night TV and not just on the BBC. Merlin, like Robin Hood before him has been "modernised" for the 21st century viewer (without the greatest details), which of course has had some criticism but great viewing figures to back it up. Both of those shows have gained from being in the family friendly Doctor Who slot of the BBC One Saturday Night line up.
What most people won't know, is that the first series of Merlin has just finished being broadcast in the states on NBC, one of the biggest networks in America. It did well, it wasn't totally on prime time, 7pm on Sunday but still it held its own on NBC. The fact that a non-BBC network bought up the first series in the states, probably single-handedly funded production for the second series. And would have been great exposure of all the actors that aren't known that much outside of the show otherwise.
The Trio of Doctor Who, Robin Hood and Merlin are perfect for American ad-driven TV, for one reason, they are the perfect length to put in adverts being at 40-45 minutes long, without having to be shortened. As there is another side to this, weeks after Torchwood: Children of Earth was broadcast in the UK it was broadcast in the USA on BBC America, at the same time I was in Philadelphia visiting my sister. They did the same week long series, all hour long episodes, but thanks to the money-grabbing advertising nature of TV outside the BBC (UK), the episodes where all cut down to size. But how? That was a great series and every bit of every episode was as important as the next, that's silly.
Magic is back, as is Christmas themed chocolate in Sainsburys, as I found out yesterday (already!). This 13 part series is going to be good and as the nights draw in and as summer turns to autumn and winter, this series will keep me and millions of Brits happy this (as they would say in America) fall.
As always BBC Sport have given a good account of themselves in the broadcasting of the 29th Great North Run, with the familiar sights, familiar presenters and familiar celebrities running for their chosen cause/charity. And its always something to watch, if not just in the background. But the point that I want to turn off or over is when they start showing the text messages with support for people on the race course (that they can't see) and when they start to get lazy and put some random music on just to fill some time whilst the thousands pass the cameras.
I'm not saying that it's not a good thing to do, I'd love to do a couple of them in my lifetime. But I think it's more tiring for the people near the end of the course cheering everyone on, especially when the main pack come through the 13 miles and down the sea front at South Shields.
Sometimes I'm glad when the Great North Run or the London Marathon's on because TV on a Sunday morning is rubbish now that I don't watch Something for the Weekend or normally don't go near T4. But when you watch the Run, you work out that 13 miles, isn't that long and how I feel like lazy bastard sitting here watching it, but cause I'm 16 I can't actually run the race, I think the cut off is 17. Maybe when I'm 19 I'll do the London Marathon, don't hold me to that.
Watching a recent Sainsburys ad for their Basics range, with as ever, Jamie Oliver at the helm of the campaign, Jamie said, whilst staring into a spoon said "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder". I didn't know what this meant, so after doing some research I found out that it was a phrase embedded in history, and believe me the beauty wasn't anything to do with that carrot.
The person who is widely credited with coining the saying in its current form is Margaret Wolfe Hungerford (née Hamilton), who wrote many books, often under the pseudonym of 'The Duchess'. In Molly Bawn, 1878, there's the line "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder", which is the earliest citation of it that it can found in print. Even though its been found in the play Love's Labours Lost by William Shakespeare, it wasn't in as many words and the phrase has apparently seen in literature as far back as the 3rd Century BC in Greek literature.
I say this because Jamie has been doing television for nearly as long as that phrase has been in circulation. So why am I not bored of him yet? Well he's an honest guy and there isn't a lot of fault with him. Yeah, he might have been a bit annoying in the early years, "the naked chef", but he's matured, and also he hasn't run off to America, like most people in British TV are always trying to. Here's the ad if you haven't seen it yet:
Sometimes you have to go through life enduring television, yes, Big Brother and all, before you find some truly fantastic TV and hopefully in our lifetimes. Television can provoke, excite and anger but we still watch it. It can be used as a tool for good and bad, and don't get me started on politics on TV (no more so than in America).
This Blog will illustrate television in all its glory and shame, nothing is off limits, considering I live in front of the TV (and on facebook), I think that I'll try and do my best. And by the way this blog will be mainly about British TV, but america is some Television I will love getting stuck into, mainly the media and "News"-casting in the States, this'll be fun.
Jamie Says Basics is..