Surprisingly this new series has felt rather fresh, rather fun again, despite it being in it’s 100th series (well, it feels like that anyway). Johnny Vegas and Will Self are on much better form this time around, having really settled in to their roles, I’ll never tire of Bob teasing Ulrika about all the footballer’s she’s shagged, and even a few of the celeb guests have been funny this time around.
Make My Day (10.35pm, Fridays, C4)
There’s something so joyously upbeat about this show which really makes it fun to watch. As one unsuspecting member of the public has the maddest day of their lives, as fifty hidden camera’s film it all, you cant help but be drawn in to how great a time they’re having, and this time around it’s a little more surreal, with moments including Steve Davis hustling some snooker players and Caprice discovering her fiancé is already wed hilarious stuff.
Pollyanna (6pm, New Years Day, ITV)
I don’t know how to explain this, really I don’t. But despite being on ITV, this quaint, well acted and carefully directed children’s drama was damn fine stuff. No, really. Maybe it’s because I was viciously hungover and just wanted to watch something soothing and undemanding, but yes, alright, I really enjoyed this. So make sure you catch it when it’s inevitably repeated next Christmas.
Ant and Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway (7pm, Saturdays, ITV)
Ant and Dec are so in danger of over saturation, of producing so many average but not particularly good programmes that they really should take a break and try and come back with something really good, perhaps akin to the C4 comedy show they made years back. This is okay, a kind of mix of nearly every early evening Saturday variety show ever made, but it’s just a little too weak, and lacks any spontaneity or originality.
Born Sloppy (11pm, Friday, C4)
A sometimes pretty great and sometimes goddamn awful music / chat show, which all depends on how good the guests are and whether or not Sara Cox is on form or not. It’s got a healthy dose of swearing in it, Colin Murray’s various segments have been pretty amusing in a childish kind of way, and at least it showcases decent alternative music. So watch it. But don’t expect it always to be good.
The performances are particularly wooden, the characters sketchily drawn out, and it’s near on impossible to sympathise with anyone here, which is a bit of a major problem in a 20 hour mini series (well, 15 hours here in the UK as its advert break less). The special effects are on the rather average side too, and are spaced so far apart that you can easily forget that you’re watching a sci-fi drama.
So has there been anything good about it? Well, aside from the odd nice twist – Head alien hunter Colonel Hargreaves turning out to be a psychopath, the alien found at Roswell causing people to die within 20 minutes whilst treating them to a hallucination of what they most want to see - no, not really. So where's it all going? Are the aliens really all that bad? Or is it really us who are the enemy? Yep, there questions I don’t know if I can be bothered to wait for the answer too, as with a script this hackneyed there's likely to be few answers that really satisfy, especially when it entails watching a further 9 hours of this guff.
RI:SE (6.55am, Weekdays, C4)
I really can’t fathom why the media seems to have it in for C4’s Rise, criticising poor viewing figures (as if that’s ever been a sign of quality) and the show’s hosts with vicious savagery. Then again, I always quite liked the former version of the show, the sense of anarchy where something was almost guaranteed to go wrong at least five times every morning, and the way that no matter how serious the day’s news was that day, the presenters were far more concerned with making puns and examining the minutiae of celebrity life. And despite the change of hosts and format, the new version is pretty much the same.
Hosts Edith Bowman and Iain Lee are perhaps lacking in chemistry a little, and I’m pretty sure that Edith really doesn’t like Iain in the slightest, but that makes it all the more fun to watch. If it were on late at night, it’d be great to base a drinking game around, where you get to down a shot with every withering look she gives him. Now I’ve not had too much time for Lee in the past, he was far too smug on the Eleven O Clock show and too many of his jokes centred around male and female reproductive organs, here though, he’s given more of a free vein to make sarcastic, cruel and cutting comments, and at least he isn’t bland and agreeable like pretty much every other breakfast time presenter on at the moment.
Apart from summaries of the news and sport, the show’s filled with rather gimmicky ideas, but most of them work well enough, certainly for this time of the morning. Txtecution, a tiny tiny version of Big Brother, where five people try to persuade you that they deserve to win a holiday, whilst viewers get the chance to vote off the one they hate the most each day, is fun mostly because of Lee’s dismissive attitude towards the contestants and is certainly more innovative than anything the show has tried before. The review of the papers section is a little lazy, and yes, the all night girls really are annoying, but both these sections are over with quite quickly, whilst the various celebrity interviews are surprisingly fun, especially consider the general calibre of the guests.
The only really appalling moments of the show come when Mel and Sue arrive. I’ve had a lot of time for them in the past, and maybe it’s the time of day which isn’t suited to them, because simply put, they’re just not that funny. The interviews they conduct, normally with guests who have already chatted to Iain and Edith, reveal nothing of interest at all, and it really is a struggle to watch. Still, most people head off to work at around the time they come on, so I guess it shouldn’t matter too much.
The alternative to watching RI:SE is Eamon Holmes’ self-satisfied fat face talking jovially about the soaps or the threat of nuclear war, crappy cartoons or kids shows on Five, or the Beeb’s Breakfast effort, which now that Jeremy Bowen has left, I’ve only managed to watch about 2 minutes of before collapsing in to unconsciousness. And these comparisons only serve to make watching RI:SE much more appealing. Tired of being patronised in the mornings – well there is an alternative, and you really should be watching it.
The Richard Taylor Interviews (23:15, Wednesdays, C4)
Hidden away in the schedules at the time of night where most people will find themselves switching off the tv and seeking solace in sleep is one of this comedy gems of the last 12 months, smart, surreal and nearly always very very funny.
Based around a selection of fake job interviews, where members of the public attempt to succeed in getting work in increasingly surreal situations, the extremes that members of the public have gone too have been outstandingly hilarious, and all kudos to them as they mostly try to keep a straight face whilst answering bizarre questions and coping with insane situations.
Richard Taylor’s great at bizarre one liners, the situations (including getting people to talk in a large box, make furniture, and judge their partners in a Pop Idol putdown kind of way) often beggar belief, yet rarely has anyone ever been less than deadly serious which makes it all the more amusing, though at times you’ll find yourself struggling to believe they haven’t cottoned on. I guess this is mainly due to their desperation to get a job, and it’s just a shame that the programme doesn’t show the victims discovering that they’ve been filmed. Because I imagine there reactions have been truly comedy-tastic.
A second series is unlikely, as presumably too many members of the general public will know who Taylor is, and the idea can only be stretched so far anyway, so you really should catch it now. A little tiredness the next day at work is well worth it.
Messiah 2 (21:00, Saturday 11th, Sunday 12th Jan, BBC1)
A perfect example of the BBC being really really lazy, this dark and gritty serial killer drama may have had a little more gore and disturbing imagery than say, your average episode of Inspector Morse, but it really lacked any originality or innovation, and as there were really only four plausible suspects it will come as no surprise to anyone that it wasn’t exactly hard to pick the killer.
Lead detective Red Metcalfe was just a rehash of Cracker, and whilst Ken Stott’s a fine actor, making what could have been a rather two dimensional role rather interesting, but he really wasn’t given that much to do. The rest of the cast were okay, far above The Bill levels of acting, but still really had little to do that look either confused or concerned. The central idea, that Policemen were being killed off because of previous crimes they’d mishandled or deliberately framed an innocent person for, wasn’t the groundbreaking or shocking device that presumably the writer believed it to be – once again, its been seen in other tv shows / films in the past. And whilst the killing off of a child with Down Syndrome’s child may be considered brave, in context it seemed largely pointless, just a way of making viewers think that they were watching something ground-breaking. When really all they were doing was watching something pretty damn naff.
Worst of all, Messiah 2 reeked of Seven, complete with a bizarre if fitting motive and a twist ending, though lacked any of the innovation and real darkness of that great film. That shouldn’t be a surprise though, I mean this is BBC1 and it’s been years since they produced anything that interesting.
Christmas Tv Roundup
Yes, yes, everyone complained about it at the time, but a month on and I’m still fuming. Ranting just has to take place. For despite some pretty shoddy Christmas’s over the years, tv wise this was by far the worst I’ve ever seen. The film’s were mostly terrible, and the odd exception or two to this rule had been shown countless times before, the soaps, and especially Eastender’s were predictably gloomy – for Christ’s sake, cant the residents of the various streets and squares enjoy even one good crimbo? And pretty much everything else was terrible too.
So what were the highlights then? Well, ignoring all the vaguely watch-able celebrity versions of quiz shows and the like (Celebrity Blind Date being far the worst of these, and yet another sign that the show should be cancelled asap), the only programme that I truly enjoyed was Channel Four’s Dudley Moore and Peter Cook documentary on Christmas Day, a breath of (20 year’s old) fresh air, revealing much about the twosome I thought I previously thought I knew a lot about. Filled with the most extreme swearing, bizarre, twisted, and surreal humour, the only annoying thing about it was that it didn’t last long enough, and that sadly both Cook and Moore have passed away so they couldn’t contribute to it either. BBC2’s Cruise of the Gods was at least an interesting failure, funny in places and Coogan managed to turn in a performance which didn’t remind of Alan Partridge, though it seemed to be missing a 20 minute section towards the end where the characters redeem themselves as all of a sudden they both became nice guys which felt truly odd. I don’t understand the hype that surrounds Rob Brydon at the moment either, he’s only a very average actor able to pull off one type of role, that of the depressed middle aged man, and he’s not that funny at all. Still, considering how bad everything else was this year, this did shine in the schedules. And highlights wise, well that’s about it.
C4’s main US import, Dinotopia was one of those horribly simplistic and rather plastic-y looking fantasy adventures with cheap cgi, which has already been made in to a series in the US and then cancelled. And…And…Well I hate Only Fools and Horses and 5 minutes in to it could stomach no more, the same applies to Absolutely Fabulous, and unfortunately I missed what seemed to be the only good programme, the Beeb’s latest adaptation of The Hound of the Baskervilles – but was there really any need to spend millions remaking it once again rather than producing something original. And once again, nearly all the satellite channels just ignored the fact that it was Crimbo once again.
After being criticised in nearly every newspaper and magazine, we can but hope and pray that the tv companies have finally taken notice that this just isn’t good enough, and will actually put some effort in to making great tv. Ah, but even as I write that, I don’t really believe it.
Alex Finch.
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