Steve Carell as Michael Scott
Rainn Wilson as Dwight Schrute
John Krasinski as Jim Halpert
Jenna Fischer as Pam Beesley
B.J. Novak as Ryan Howard
Leslie David Baker as Stanley Hudson
Brian Baumgartner as Kevin Malone
Angela Kinsey as Angela Martin
Phyllis Smith as Phyllis Lapin
Kate Flannery as Meredith Palmer
Mindy Kaling as Kelly Kapoor
Paul Lieberstein as Toby
Creed Bratton as Creed
Oscar Nuñez as Oscar Martinez
Melora Hardin as Jan Levinson
Ed Helms as Andy Bernard
David Denman as Roy Anderson
Rashida Jones as Karen Filippelli
and Craig Robinson as Daryl Philbin


Just about everyone who's watched any amount of television should be familiar with at least one of the two versions of "The Office", so I'll assume this is the case here and I'll try to be brief. The Office: An American Workplace - alternatively known as The Office (USA) - is the American remake of the two season BBC Comedy "The Office". For the duration of this I shall be referring to the American version as "The Office" and the UK one as "The Office (UK)".

"The Office" is a mockumentry style show that follows the members of the Scranton branch of 'Dunder Mifflin'. The team is headed by one Michael Scott (Steve Carell) and follows the action in and around the office, spiced up with talking head interviews placed around and sometimes in the middle of scenes. The members of the office are very aware of the cameras, often looking directly into them or acknowledging their presence, sometimes with annoyance. Jim in particular is prone to looking into the camera when someone else has done something he feels is rather 'interesting'.

The show mostly revolves around Michael Scott's attempts to relate with his staff members during various issues, problems and sometimes even crisis that occur and affect the branch. Michael is the American equivalent of David Brent, in that he's very poor at dealing with people and often makes a situation worse. He's awkward, socially unaware, often inappropriate and pretty much the worst boss you could ever hope for. But, there's a side to him that is caring. He genuinely thinks he's personable and likable. He wants to do what's right for his staff as he cares deeply about all of them (except for Toby, who he inexplicably hates). Steve Carrell chose to play Michael Scott without watching Ricky Gervais's performance as David Brent. And it shows in the character; as while David Brent comes across as a worthless wretch of a human being, Michael Scott is intensely sympathetic. Which makes it a lot easier to like him, he really cannot help the way he is - but he is always trying to do what's best for the people who work under him.

The other main links between the UK and American versions of the show are the Jim, Roy and Pam love triangle (Tim, Lee and Dawn in UK), the arrival of a new temp, Ryan (Ricky in UK), Jim and Pam's constant pranking of Dwight (Gareth in UK) and Michael's interactions with his direct boss Jan (the lovely Melora). But with 66 Episodes over 4 seasons so far the show develops story lines for most of its characters and gives us insight into the lives of everyone in the office.

While the show is scripted, the cast are often given opportunities to improvise; this is in part because the cast has many members who are known for their improv work and many of these moments make it into the final cut. Additionally the material that gets cut during editing is still considered to be 'cannon' and as such it can get referred to at a later date even if it hasn't been seen. This gives the show a feeling of realism and spontaneity to it that makes it a joy to watch.


Season one was picked up and ran in March 2004 to a somewhat lukewarm reception, it ran for only 6 episodes and wasn't well liked by most critics. Watching it you can see why, as the first few episodes directly life story lines and events from the UK episodes. Which makes it very easy to just say "Oh it's another bad American remake of something British", but if you look beyond this you find that the show has an unexpected depth to it. Even with similar scripts and situations it's very clear from the start that the characters are quite different to their UK counterparts (especially Michael Scott as I noted earlier).

During the first season the members of the Scranton branch deal with the arrival of the documentary crew, downsizing, the new temp, Jim's pranks on Dwight, racial diversity, new health plans, a game of basketball between the warehouse and office, an attractive purse saleswoman and a $1,000 top sales man competition.

Season one is a rocky start to the show, but it quickly finds it's footing. The main issues I have with the DVD set is it's really not worth the price. It's only 6 episodes plus deleted material and as such it should either be combined with the second season (as was done with Homicide Series 1) or dropped to about £5 in price. You want to get in with the show at this season, but it's not the best introduction you could have. As such it can make it hard for fans of the UK series to get past those recycled story lines and arrive at the gold that is season 2+.

Extras: Deleted material
Price: £10
Runtime: 2h 15mins (not including deleted material)
Price per minute: 7.5p

: 3.5


The Office Season 1 @ Rotten Tomatoes


The second season started in September of 2005 and was the first full 22 episode season of the show. This is the season where "The Office" moves away from it's progenitor and begins to walk on two feet.

During this season several romantic relationships develop or continue. Michael sleeps with his boss Jan in a moment of (her) weakness, Dwight and Angela begin a secret relationship and Jim continues to see Katy (the hot purse sales woman). Meanwhile we discover that Oscar is gay when Dwight sees him with his partner - but Dwight himself does not realise what this means.

Speaking of Dwight, he continues to be tormented by Jim and in one episode is forced to resign his position of 'volunteer reserve deputy sheriff' and in another is given lines from speeches by Adolf and Mossolini to use in a conference - which surprisingly turns out quite well for Dwight. The entire team is given sexual harassment training, Ryan starts a fire, Michael burns his foot on a George Foreman grill, Michael also stars dating a woman named Carol instead of Jan and Jim reveals his feelings to Pam and once rejected he decides to transfer away from the branch.

The problem with the UK release of the second season is pretty simple. It's a horrifying monstrosity to look at, something I've talked about before here in some detail so I won't repeat myself. Needless to say it would not hurt the producers of the first two seasons if they went back, repackaged them together and released them in a new slimline foldout book form with entirely new box art.

Apart from this the season is sheer brilliance; filled with awkward moments, funny pauses, it's the reward you get for sitting through the not quite as good first season and it is well worth watching as the performances and scripting are a work of televisual art. The extras included on the complete season DVD are also worth watching, as I mentioned before they are considered cannon and also included is the entire run of "The Accounting" webisodes and fake PSAs. All of this material is worth watching and adds a couple of hours to your viewing pleasure easily.

Extras: Deleted material, Blooper Reel, Episode Commentaries, "The Accounting" Webisodes, Fake PSAs, Steve on Steve.
Price: £22.99
Runtime: 7h 59m
Price per minute: 3p

: 4


Season 2 @ Rotten Tomatos



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Starring:
Neil Patrick Harris as Doctor Horrible/Billy
Nathan Fillion as Captain Hammer
Felicia Day as Penny
Simon Helberg as Moist

(Keep an eye out in the very first scene and look at the top left corner. Does the shape those pots and pans make look familiar to you?)

All three acts of Joss's short web musical are up and available to watch for the next 2 days at drhorrible.com (you have until midnight on the 20th, but I don't know who's midnight - assume west coast America) and I've just finished watching the third and final act now. It's brilliance at the level you'd expect from Joss.

I'll use a mostly spoiler free synopsis rather than a full review at this point.

Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog is a 45 minute musical based around a wanna-be supervillain called Dr Horrible (or Billy to his friends). Dr Horrible is an evil scientst type with a "PhD in Horrible" who's desperate to make it into the big time Evil League of Evil. But his efforts in the past have always been hindered by Captain Hammer, an individual described by the Doctor as a "corporate tool".

Doctor Horrible Blogs on the internet about his progress in an amusing parody of many online blogs, often reading out e-mails from viewers who like to point out his general incompetence. In his personal life Billy doesn't have much, he lives with a minor henchman who calls himself 'Moist' and is as pathetic as his name would suggest. His only real distraction from his desire for horrible is a young woman (Penny) who uses the same laundrette as him, but he's unable to strike up a conversation with her as he's inept around women.

Will Doctor Horrible defeat Captain Hammer? Will he get into the league? Will he get the girl? You'll have to watch the three acts to find out.

Doctor Horrible is an enjoyable experience, Joss has produced nothing but quality programming over the years, each of his shows is excellent in it's own field. The man knows how to craft excellent dialog and provide a plot that you'll want to watch again and again. The story is top-notch, the characters are instantly identifiable and everything unfolds without dragging out.

Neil Patrick Harris is stunning as the titular Dr Horrible, he hits the right pitch for every piece of dialog and is brilliant in the songs. I've said in the past that he's exceptionally talented - he's the best thing on "How I Met Your Mother" - and Dr Horrible shows this. Nathan Fillon is fantastic as Captain Hammer, he brings a level of pomp and arrogance to the role that makes you immediately dislike the Captain. He makes it easy to root for the villain when the "hero" is such a bully and a thug. It's refreshing to see a superhero portrayed as someone who gets his kicks beating on people weaker than him, even though he's on the side of the law he's not a good person. It also helps that Nathan can carry a tune and he sounds good singing in counterpoint to Neil and Felicia.

Felicia Day is quite good as Penny, I say quite good because she is one of the only weak points in this whole production. Her singing is rather, generic. That is, her voice doesn't have much variation in it when she sings her numbers. She sounds pretty similar in all of them, it's not exactly a big problem. In fact it highlights how mundane she is in comparison to the other two, she's just an ordinary girl who cares about helping the homeless. She's great in all of the dialog scenes and fantastic in the big musical number where she sings counterpoint to Neil.

Still, that minor grip aside there's very little wrong with Doctor Horrible's Sing-Along Blog at all, the only other complaint I have is that it's only around 45 minutes long. I can't help but wish it was longer. But maybe; as it has been such a success, we'll see more from Doctor Horrible in the future.

It will be available on DVD eventually, so you'll be able to own it after it's been taken down online.


Full marks with the 5 gold TVs, bravo!
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This week Carla meets with Michael face to face and asks him to get in contact with a skilled Tunisian counterfitter who can duplicate a high tech key card for her organisation. Also, Michael is approached via Sam by a waitress who's being stalked and asked to help her out.


[Episode Spoilers Below]


Thankfully the writers of Burn Notice have decided not to drag out the moment before Michael and Carla meet face to face, the episode pretty much opens with it - following on almost directly from the scene where Sam met her the following week. Michael heads out with Sam and Fi for the meeting, with the intention of getting Sam to photograph her while Fi follows her. Predictibly this doesn't work, in fact I was left wondering why Michael thought it would work. He's such an astute spy he should have known his friends would be clocked the moment they were in the same area as Carla. But he doesn't and they are.


Carla hands him the afformentioned key card and explains that there's only one man in Miami who can make something like this. Michael has to set up a meeting and get the counterfit duplicate made. Sam then meets up with Michael and explains about helping Sophia, Michael is reluctant to help at first but decides to do so at least in part for Sam. While scouting out the "stalker" Raul they realise he isn't exactly what Sophia made him out to be, as he's packing a Mac 10.

Meanwhile, Fi goes to the one man who'd know where the counterfitter would be, Barry the money launderer. It's nice to see Barry back on screen again; even if it's only for a moment, and he's suitbly sleezy when dealing with Fi. Something she's more than happy to respond too in her prefered manner, with violence and threats. I do find Fi's love of violence refreshing in some manners, it's great that the most trigger happy character in the show is in fact a woman. But it's a little stereotypical that she's also Irish.

Michael confronts Sophia over Raul and after some shrewd observations about inconsistencies in her story he gets her to admit to the truth. She's a DEA agent, Raul is part of a drug cartel and she's been trying to get enough to arrest him for two years. Unfortunately she's in over her head, but unwilling to tell the DEA as that would get her pulled from the case. Michael learns about the organisation and comes up with a plan to get her out of there and take Raul down in about 30 seconds. You have to wonder why they burned him if he's that good at this job.

Michael meets the counterfiter with another flimsy cover identity, this time he dresses up in a terrible shell suit top and puts on a slight voice while he pretends to be a low skill counterfitter who specialises in cheque washing (once again Burn Notice teaches you something the public shouldn't learn about, this time it's how to blank cheques that have been used before). It's nowhere near as funny as his British performance last week, but it's still entertaining to watch.


Once again Carla and her people break into Michael's mother's house, this time to replace the coffee maker with a new one. He takes this pretty well, they're consistently trying to rattle his cage but he hasn't gotten angry or worried about the bunch of trained spies who seem to treat his mother's place as a place to leave him messages and screw with his head. His mother also seems to be completely oblivious to the events, assuming Michael bought the new coffee maker for her. She also asks that he go to councelling sessions with her, counselling sessions that don't work out.

Michael manages to work his way into Raul's confidences and starts to put his plan into motion when he hits a few setbacks, the first of which is when Raul discovers that Michael and Sophia have been talking on the phone to each other. Something Raul mistakenly assumes is to do with them sleeping together, but Michael keeps his cool and doesn't give anything away while talking Raul down with a believable story about "checking him out in advance". The second snag he hits is when Raul turns out to be far more loyal than Michael had estimated. His initial plan to get Raul eliminated as a potential leak of information becomes impossible because Raul brings him to meet his boss Campos. So Michael rigs the situation to make it seem like Raul wanted to have Campos killed and this forces Raul to go to the DEA rather than get killed.

Michael returns to collect the duplicate from the counterfitter and also asks him to find out where the keycard would be used. But Carla's organisation are ahead of him and attempt to kill Nezi right after their meeting. Michael realises this but gets back too late to save him. He does manage to reclaim his money and gets another copy of the key card for his troubles.
Finally he meets again with Carla to give her the money, the counterfit and the original and he gets her to show off by communicating in Arabic. Which gives him a clue to her identity as she has a Kurdish accent. It's not much, but Sam agrees to do what he can.



Turn and Burn is classic Burn Notice, but with an added layer of complexity. The 'problem of the week' format is followed but this time the 'big season metaplot' also gets equal screen time. As such you get two stories in this episode, but it doesn't feel too packed in or rushed. All of the cast are excellent when on screen, Bruce and Jeffery provide the best performances (as usual) but Tricia is very good when she's on screen and looks very good with a more natural appearance to her (compared to BSG) except for her smile, sometimes it's just darn creepy and really unflattering.

Clues as to Carla's agenda continue to arrive, previously we had a collection of high security data files and this week we have an exceptionally high tech key card being duplicated. It's clear there's a major heist on the books, but why, who, where and how come everything needed is in Miami hasn't come to light yet. Next week promises to reveal even more about her.

There's a lot to enjoy in this episode and it's probably better than the season opener (which was still good).


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Before I begin, I just watched the second Act of Doctor Horrible and pretty much the only complaint I have is it's only 13 mins long per act. I'll write about it in full once it's finished this weekend.

Today instead I give you two interlinked shows called Moving Wallpaper and Echo Beach. It'll be best to deal with these two shows separately and then talk about the entire thing as a whole.



Starring:
Elizabeth Berrington as Mel Debrou
Raquel Cassidy as Nancy Weeks
Sarah Hadland as Gillian McGovern
Sinead Keenan as Kelly Hawkins
Dave Lamb as Carl Morris
James Lance as Tom Warren
Lucy Liemann as Sam Phillips
and Ben Miller as Johnathan Pope

Moving Wallpaper is a term that's used to describe television in general and often applied to TV Soaps in particular. It's based on the way many people use TV shows as sort of a background. Moving Wallpaper the TV show on the other hand is a comedy show about the fictional writers of the TV Soap Echo Beach; a brand new post watershed ITV Soap. Ben Miller plays Johnathan Pope, the new producer drafted in by the network to make Echo Beach into a huge success. Unfortunately for the writers of the show Pope is something of an ass, lacking any real social awareness while muddling his way through something of a mid life crisis.

The writing team consists of Gillian - a new age feminist, Carl - an aging, single man who's useless around women, Tom - a handsome and smooth individual with a streak in cruel practical jokes, Sam - the script editor and normally the level head of the group, Kelly - the secretary and Mel - John's assistant. They're a somewhat neurotic group who struggle with the constant demands of the network and have their problems additionally compounded by Pope's antics. Pope himself has a lot to handle as his direct boss is Nancy, a women with an intense dislike for him as she sees through all his pretences and understands just how obnoxious he is.

Each episode of Moving Wallpaper is about the difficulties involved in writing the corresponding episode of Echo Beach. While watching you can see how events that occur in and around the writers end up making it into the script for various reasons. You can also hear dialog that later makes it into the script. Moving Wallpaper is a fast paced and witty show that's not afraid to have some off the wall characters and run with the concept. It's an exceptionally strong sitcom that's enjoyable to watch. Ben Miller's performance in particular is fantastic and he carries himself well throughout the show, not afraid to look like a complete w****r when the situation requires it.

ITV's home page for Moving Wallpaper



Starring:
Jason Donovan as Daniel Marrack
Martine McCutcheon as Susan Penwarden
Hugo Speer as Mark Penwarden
Ed Speleers as Jimmy Penwarden
Hannah Lederer-Alton as Abie Marrack
and Susie Amy as Angela Cole

Echo Beach is the linked soap "created" by the characters from Moving Wallpaper, it's based in Polnarren, Cornwall and initially was supposed to be a worthy drama about social issues in Cornwall. But Johnathan Pope arrived and decided to sex it all up with stunt casting, exciting story lines and a gorgeous cast. The plots for the show mostly revolve around the Marrack and Penwarden families and their past involvements together.

And that's where I need to stop talking about what happened in Echo Beach (if you want to read more here's the wikipedia entry). Because I really did not enjoy watching it at all, I hoped that there was going to be something entertaining in watching it. That the show might hit say the utterly ludicrous level of Sunset Beach and provide an ironic parody of the whole soap experience. But in fact it doesn't, it seems that the creators of Echo beach decided to try and create a proper honest to goodness soap. It's like watching a poor facsimile of any other British soap and as I really cannot tolerate them I found the experience dull and slightly painful. It's very jarring moving from such an entertaining and witty sitcom into a dull and predictable soap and as such I found myself ignoring the television while Echo Beach was on and only paying attention when the segments occurred that were obviously linked to the relevant Moving Wallpaper episode. It was a nice experience to see how the dialog and events from Moving Wallpaper "inspired" the direction that Echo Beach took. But this wasn't enough to hold my interest.

I'd go as far as saying that watching Echo Beach almost replicated the experience of going to a British Beach. In that it sounds exciting and you expect a wonderful time. But once you get there you end up sitting about bored stiff in dull weather, yearning to be back home where you can do something more productive; like say, removing your own teeth with a chisel and hammer.


Taken together as a package these shows are a fantastic concept, it's a real stroke of genius to come up with the idea of a mockumentry showing the writers and then have the show they write follow it up. But the key problem with the entire thing is the lack of viewership preferences between the two shows and the weak nature of Echo Beach. In the collected boxed set you watch first one episode of Moving Wallpaper and then one of Echo Beach, this means you're switching back and forth between a show you're interested in and one you (may) not be in interested in at all. How often does the TV soap and sitcom demographic collide?

It could have worked if Echo Beach had been a bit less serious, if it had taken some truly ridiculous moments and worked them in. Classic soap moments like, the return of a previously dead character, the evil twin, the abandoned child returning or impregnation with a turkey baster. But instead Echo Beach plays it too straight and instead of giving us a modern Acorn Antiques it delivers something like Hollyoaks, but even more boring. I know it was meant to be rubbish, but it managed to be rubbish in an utterly mundane manner - it's no Plan 9 from Outer Space.

Fortunately, Echo Beach has been dropped from the line-up and is being replaced with a show about zombies. (See Dan's Media Digest here and Digital Spy here). Now zombies has a real potential for providing either laughs or a fresh new experience. There hasn't been a zombie based TV series on UK television that I can recall (feel free to prove me wrong) and it doesn't matter if they play it straight, funny or attempt to make it look really bad they should have a hit on their hands. Additionally there is a lot more crossover of demographic between fans of comedy and horror, just look at Shaun of the Dead and Spaced. It's a brilliant idea, I love it!



As I mentioned the DVD set of Moving Wallpaper/Echo Beach alternates between one ep of Wallpaper and then the matching episode of Echo Beach. This is fine as it's how the show was meant to be watched, but in all honesty it's not a pleasant experience to do this. As such I'd thoroughly suggest you instead pick up just Moving Wallpaper by itself and experience the good half of the shows. The extras on this twin set are all related to Moving Wallpaper and they're brilliant, including a fantastically disturbing performance from Jason Donavon in one webisode of 'The Mole Diaries'.

Unfortunately the DVD menus do not contain a play all option for each separate series, so you'll either have to watch all of them, skip the Echo Beach episodes or watch one episode at a time via the single episode menu.


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Just reminding y'all that Act I of Doctor Horrible's Sing-along Blog is up online today for the world to see.

Direct link to it is here.

Enjoy, it's legendary!
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Season three of The Wire returns from Baltimore docks back to the streets and their kingpins with a vengeance. Stringer Bell is firmly entrenched in the Barksdale organisation and so cautious that none of the old tricks are working against him or his crew. Avon is back out from jail and the various kingpins have formed a cooperative group to manage distribution of their drug stashes, but there's a new kingpin on the block called Marlo Stanfeld and he wants more than his share of the action. In the police force, Major Howard "Bunny" Calvin is currently in charge of the western district (where the Barksdales operate) and is getting increasingly desperate in the face of all the failure. McNulty and the detail are stuck bashing their heads against failed surveillance and there's increasing pressure from the mayor's office to produce results. The betrayal of Frank Sobotka by a member of the FBI resulted in "The Greek" and Spiros making their escape at the end of the last season, so the flow of drugs into the city has not been halted much.

Meanwhile Bodie has risen in the ranks of the Barksdale organisation and things are looking pretty profitable for him in the future, as long as Omar's crusade against the Barksdales's doesn't bring everything down around them all. A few new players emerge on the scene as well, including the driven and ambitious councilman Tommy Carcetti - who is determined to become the next mayor of Baltimore - and Dennis 'Cutty' Wise, a former Barksdale Enforcer who's just gotten out of prison.

The third season of The Wire stacks the deck high from the very start, things have not gone well for the Baltimore P.D. despite some successes at the docks. Everything is looking bleak for the Major Crimes detail and their lack of success means they're struggling to stay afloat. It's pretty much life as usual in Baltimore, no matter how hard the police try to keep the law there's always someone out there supplying the demand.

The narrative and characterisation in the third season is superb, the show hits a stride that surpasses the excellent second season and brings you a rich, detailed and bleak world. A world where you experience both sides of the equation and learn to love or hate all the players in the picture. The third season is phenomenal, but what is even more staggering is the fact that the next season improves even further.





The box deviates from the previous style somewhat, providing a blue filtered shot of Avon and Stringer from the viewpoint of McNulty. It's the mirror image of the shot at the top of this post, and stands to highlight the dual nature of the narrative in the show. The rest of the box has been kept in a very close style to match the previous two, on the shelf it's only the colour of the spine (and the text) that differentiates it from previous seasons. It's also has a very small shelf profile (about 1cm wide) which means it's doesn't take up much room.

The plastic DVD case contains all 5 DVDs with ease and even has room for the small booklet. It's a triumphant marriage of design and practicality.


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Starring:
Gary Cole as Harvey Birdman
Stephen Colbert as Phil Ken Seben/Myron Reducto
Thomas Allen as Peanut
John Michael Higgins as Mentok the Mindtaker
Chris Edgerly as Peter Potamus
Maurice LaMarche as Various
Peter MacNicol as X, the Eliminator
Grey DeLisle as Debbie
Erik Richter as Avenger
Phil LaMarr as Black Vulcan
and Paget Brewster as Birdgirl

Back in the 1960s there was an average at best children's cartoon called "Birdman and the Galaxy Trio" a cartoon divided into two sets of stories, one starring the titular Birdman and the other starring Galaxy Girl and her two colleagues Vapor Man and Meteor Man. The show was very lackluster and after two years it disappeared off into the vaults destined to never be thought of again. (Except as "How not to do it")

That is until Michael Ouweleen and Erik Richter decided to create a spin-off inspired by Space Ghost: Coast to Coast. The character Birdman had made an appearance on SG:C2C previously (with the first name Harvey) and it seems this is what sparked HB:AtL into existence. Of course, this technically means HB:AtL is a spin-off from two separate shows, one of which is a spin-off itself. I guess it's a 2 ½nd generation spin-off mutant bastard child thing. But despite this it's a surprisingly good show.

HB:AtL deals with Harvey's life after his time as a superhero, as to be expected from the title of the show Harvey has become an attorney since he hung up his suit for the last time. Likewise many of the super villains he previously encountered have also given up their various nefarious plans to move into law. Harvey spends much of his time working as a criminal defense attorney or civil litigator in Sebben & Sebben's law firm (Phil Ken Sebben was previously known as Falcon 7 on Birdman) and he has various Hanna-Babera characters of old as clients. The list of his clientele includes Atom Ant, Fred Flintstone, Inch-High Private Eye, Scooby and Shaggy, Droopy, Captain Caveman and the Jetsons.

The show is a short 10 minuted animated affair that derives it's humor from pop culture references, humanisation of superheroes/villains, observations of Hanna-Barbera inconsistencies/strangeness and good old slapstick. It ran for 39 episodes (with a 20 minute finale) and just about every episode is filled to the brim with quality comedy. The short run time ensures that not a single moment in the show is wasted, there's a constant, well-paced movement from one event to the next and the jokes never let up. The animation style is clean and detailed - some jokes are placed on screen for less than a second: so there's plenty to see on a second or third viewing. (It wasn't until my third viewing of this series that I spotted the Kevin Costner/Waterworld/Mutant joke for example.)

The character acting is just top notch, Gary Cole portrays a Harvey who's barely able to keep it together with pitch perfect dialog. Stephen Colbert is phenomenal as the paranoid Reducto and the strange and off-beat Phil Ken Sebben. But for me personally it's the performances of John Michael Higgins as Mentok and Chris Edgerly as a truly perverted Peter Potamus that entertain me the most. This is not to take anything out of the other actors involved in the project, even the guest stars are superb (especially Frank Welker reprising his role as Freddy) and there's never a dull character or performance from anyone.

Harvey Birdman is one of the best in the range of 'adult' cartoons out there, it looks good, sounds amazing and has almost peerless comedy. It's fantastic fun for the generations that grew up with the old Hanna-Barbera cartoons and very watchable for others. I really can't recommend it enough, It'll only take approximately 400 minutes of your life to see all of it, but you'll certainly want to go back and watch it all again and again.



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Bonekickers was on recently and well... It's awful. But I wanted to take a moment just to promote two excellent reviews both of which have ment I didn't entirely waste my time watching it. I could still get a chuckle out of reading these. They're worth a gander even if you haven't seen the episode in question as they recreate the experience of watching it pretty accurately.

First of all there's Jaxvor's review located here, I always enjoy reading Jaxvor's opinions on bad British television as he manages to sum up how I feel about them, but with more style.

And second there's Rob's review here, Rob also managed to sum up many of my feelings on it. He has also used the phrase "...it's astonishingly bollocks: an absolutely hellish piece of brain-warping daftness." when describing it. Brilliant!

Suffice to say, I'm torn between never watching this piece of rubbish again. Or watching it just so I can enjoy reading good reviews tearing it apart. That's the main reason why I watch Torchwood.
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[Naturally this review will contain mild spoilers]


It's been about nine months since Michael Western drove on board that truck and we were left wondering what would change about Burn Notice. Well, the wait is now over and the answer thankfully is "very little". The season premier kicks off directly after the last season ended, Michael is still in the truck and he's deposited at a location where we can hear gunfire, explosions and shouting. After all this dies down Michael heads out to discover an exploded plane, several dead people and one trussed up man laying on the ground in an airfield.

The woman who's got in contact with him at the end of the last season, (she identifies herself as 'Carla') tells him he needs to assist the guy in stealing some data from a computer system he designed. Which means Michael is going back to Miami, returning to Fiona, Sam and Madeline. While this is a somewhat predictable move, it was also a fantastic one as I'm thrilled that there haven't been any major cast losses as the gang were great last season.

Speaking of the cast, how are they on their return?
Well Jeffrey Donovan is still on top form as Michael Western, he's able to charismatically propel the narrative along and looks just as believable in the role as he did last season. He's obviously comfortable playing the straight man of the series and provides a solid board for everyone else to bounce off. But that doesn't mean he's above being funny on occasion, his English accent in this episode is so unbelievably bad that it moves around the scale to being so bad it's hilarious.

Speaking of accents Gabrielle Anwar's American one has improved since last season and she sounds more natural and comfortable using it. Of course, I'm not a native to the big old Isle of USA so take my comments on American accents with a pinch of salt, but it does sound less jarring to my ear at least. Gabrielle's character; Fi hasn't changed much since the previous season. But given that there has only been a 48 hour gap since she last saw Michael that's understandable. Her best scenes remain those where she interacts with Bruce Campbell's character - Sam Axe and the longest scene she has with Michael essentially wraps up any emotional interest she had in him last season. Does this mean the plot will move on to getting Michael involved with a different woman? (Carla?)

Bruce Campbell is every bit as brilliant as he always is, right from his first appearance in this episode wearing one of Michael's too small shirts and all the way through he's just funny and charismatic. He doesn't have that much to do in this episode except look beaten up, talk to Fi and chat up women. But he does that well, he's superb as Michael's sidekick and knows how to provide just the right about of flair. Bruce doesn't overact and steal the scenes from Jeffery, but you do always notice and enjoy his time on screen.

Sharon Gless also reprises her role as Madeline Western, but she has little to do in this episode apart from complain at Michael a little and look put upon, she's obviously unhappy to learn her son is a spy. She also gets mildly harassed by the people who are involved with Carla, nothing major happens to her here, they just do it to send a message to Michael.

The surprise in the show has sadly been signaled well in advance, it was advertised that Tricia Helfer would be joining the cast as Michael's handler. She's such a distinctive individual for people who've watched BSG that will recognise her voice immediately and clock her as soon as she appears on screen. She hasn't had a lot of physical screen time at this point, but the phone conversations she's had with Michael have been good, although sometimes they do give you flashbacks of Number Six conversations with Baltar.

The story is all you'd expect and want from an episode of Burn Notice, it's fast paced, energetic and fun with almost everything wrapped up by the end of the episode apart from a teaser about the main plot. I'm hoping that the later episodes give the viewer a little more evolution in the show style (shows can get trapped just providing the same thing over and over) especially after the tense and exciting last season finale, but this is not a comment on the first episode. Which was funny, exciting and great to watch.

Till next week, here's a shot of everyone's favourite hunk showing a little chest hair!


;)
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Just a friendly reminder that Burn Notice returns this evening. Set boxes to record! Additionally I wanted to share something I've been appreciating for a while, but I kept forgetting to do so.

Comedy Central have made a huge selection of their shows available worldwide with their own website player. I'm now able to legitimately watch The Colbert Report after it's aired. It's all located over at the following address.

http://www.comedycentral.com/colbertreport/index.jhtml

The show is brilliant and now is a great time to catch up a little as they're all on holiday.
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Homicide is a critically acclaimed, multiple award winning drama which I've mentioned before a couple of times (here and here). A show that was described by TV Guide as "The best show you're not watching", a show that in part gave birth to the greatest TV show on earth. Homicide is a show that was utterly ground breaking for its time, it changed the landscape of television as profoundly as Six Feet Under did in later years.
Set in Balitmore, Maryland; Homicide is an iconic police procedural show that really captured the feel of the word 'gritty'. The first season introduces the viewer to the members of the Baltimore P.D. Homicide Division and throws them headlong into Charm City. This boxed set contains the complete first and second seasons, which number at thirteen episodes in total (9 for season 1, 4 for season 2). Each episode runs at around 45 minutes and tends to contain multiple plot lines on different cases, the first "series" includes a powerful guest star spot from Robin Williams, the first season itself won two Emmys (Best Director, Best Writer) and the episode "Night of the Dead Living" won a WGA award.

The cast itself are a talented bunch of actors and gel together almost instantly, ranging from the legendary genre hopping character John Munch, through the shift Lieutenant Al Giardello to the new member of the division Tim Bayliss (who lands a nightmare case for his first ever) and his partner the powerhouse Frank Pembleton every character is well realised and rounded. If you enjoy well written crime drama Homicide is a winner. The only reason this doesn't hit a 10 is some people may begrudge the lack of traditional gunfights and car chases that normally occur in US police drama.


The UK packaging for Homicide is iconic and in my opinion superior to the USA version, it's a fold out book contained in a dust sheet with striking box art. I really love the noir feel to this packaging and I'm a fan of the cardboard construction as it feels nice to touch when you take it off the shelf. The look of the DVDs is continued throughout the set, but there is a switch to plastic casing for the 4 and 5th series, this breaks the unity of the set on the shelf so loses a couple of marks.




The region 1 version of this DVD is stuffed to the gills with extras but for some reason not one of these made the transition across the Atlantic, sadly the region 2 viewer gets no insights into the making of the show, no deleted scenes... nada. There doesn't really seem to be much reason for this decision, it's a bit of a kick in the head to be honest.


Running at 613 minutes the first series of Homicide will set you back a meager £13.99 from play.com and send it have it for a staggering £11.89 right now. This is 1.9p per min, which is just astronomical.


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I set up a new template for the blog and customised it a little (wearing TV "gang colours proudly now"). During the process I lost several links to the blogs I read and can't find all of them again. Duh... (The archives don't work the way I want them to either, but meh, I can live.)

So I'm open to any suggestions about TV related blogs here. If you have a TV blog I'm up for reading it, if you know of a good one - put it here. I'm open to suggestions!
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Well I came across this via Aaron William's blog (points to the right) and I was a little ashamed of myself that I wasn't already aware of it. Dr. Horrible is a three part series (I'm not sure if more are planned after this) from Joss Whedon starring the excellent Neil Patrick Harris as Dr. Horrible and Nathan Fillion as his arch rival Captain Hammer.

Here's the trailer



Ok, so it'll be shown in three parts I believe on the 15th, 17th and 19th of July and then the entire thing will be available to watch online on the 20th (which is the final date for the free airings) - there will be a DVD version (with extras) later. The creator, the cast, the subject and the fact that it's free makes this a must watch.

Sites:
Doctor Horrible's Sing-Along Blog
The Official Site
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