Is There Anybody Out There?

Have you been watching “Live from Studio Five“, the new tea-time magazine programme on Five? Me neither, and judging by the ratings and criticism section on its Wikipedia entry linked above, no-one else either. However, yesterday while I was idly channel hopping while reading Twitter updates on my phone, I stumbled over Melinda Messenger, Ian Wright (Wright Wright) and Kate from the Apprentice sat behind a desk and talking about the pop culture issues of the day. For reasons unclear, I left them chattering while I tweeted. What a strange world we inhabit. On the surface it seems like there is a genuinely entertaining programme struggling to get out but it’s almost impossible to define what that might be.

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Tags: Five, Ian Wright, Kate Walsh, Live From Studio Five, Melinda Messenger

Highlighter Pen at The Ready

It continues to amuse me that the greatest weekly magazine that the UK produces continues to be called the Radio Times despite the fact that almost nobody uses it for looking forward to radio listings but instead plan their TV viewing for the forthcoming week. And, of the 51 issues that get released every year, it is the “legendary” (their own word) double-sized Christmas issue that makes for the greatest read. So, for this post, with the trusty tome by my side, I will provide my own

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Tags: BBC, Channel-4, Christmas, Five, Radio-Times, Schedules, Sky, TV, UK

Vanished… From The Schedules

Amid no fanfare and barely a trailer to be seen, the UK’s fifth terrestrial channel has begun to show another US import. Vanished appears to be a child of the genre that has brought us 24, Prison Break, or Murder One (if you’re a little older) where the action from the entire series revolves around a single story with lots of different threads and characters to provide added intrigue.  I was actually quite impressed.  There was enough mystery and revelation to keep up viewer

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Tags: 24, Five, Five-US, Modern Drama, Prison-Break, Vanished

Wise Words #1… Quit While You’re Ahead 

The second and last series of US sitcom, Joey has stared airing on channel five on Sunday evenings and it would seem that they have decided to show it as a series of double headers. This is good news, it means it will all be over more quickly. Having watched far more repeats of Friends than can be generally deemed to be healthy for a chap of my age, I had held out hope that Joey might flourish. Americans have a pretty good record for making these kinds of spin-offs a success and,

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Tags: Comedy, Five, Friends, Joey, Kevin-Smith, Matt-Le-Blanc, Tribbiani

Kingdom/House

Well, who could’ve predicted the winding career paths of Messrs Fry and Laurie after they first came to our attention in the early days of Saturday Live, Blackadder and A Bit Of Fry and Laurie? A lot of water has passed under many a bridge since then but we now find each of them in weekly doses in two astonishingly different drama series.  In fact, “drama” is quite a strong word to describe Kingdom.  A classic, British, Sunday night viewing experience in the style of Heartbeat, i.e. it

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Tags: Five, Hermione-Norris, House, ITV, Kingdom, Modern Drama, Stephen-Fry, Tony-Slattery

The Gadget Show has sneeked back on to the channel Five and continues to make for great tea-time viewing. It’s premise is a simple one of light-hearted fun messing about with new gadgets.  The three presenters seem more and more at ease with each show but the whole thing is starting to run the risk that it is more about the hosts having fun than it is about the “toys” themselves.  Take the most recent edition for example.  We were promised a challenge between Jason and Suzi

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Tags: Factual, Five, Gadget-Show, Linux, Mac-OS-X, Tomorrows-World, WiFi, Windows