Favourite TV Series

Off sick for the last two days so watched Crossfire, Inside man and Midwich Cuckoos. Crossfire was excellent apart from the last 10 mins, Inside Man was my kind of show and very enjoyable. Midwich Cuckoos I've only just begun bit it started well. Also notice it was filmed where I grew up in Amersham and indeed my old road was there so spent the evening annoying the wife by pointing out landmarks

 

North Sea drilling platform drama series The Rig (Prime) is likely to strongly divide opinion. There will be some who may reasonably conclude that this is a mighty silly load of nonsense. There will be others, on the other hand, who will feel equally strongly that this could well be the worst drama ever commissioned. But hear me out, because episode one was an enjoyable bit of schlock

The premise is straightforward enough. The Rig is crammed from its legs to the helipad full of Line of Duty and ITV drama regulars. Various personal tensions will play out. But as Scottish actor who is in everything, (Mark Bonnar) ominously notes ‘we keep on punching holes in the Earth. One day it’s going to punch back.’

Signs that the Earth has begun its fight back include seismic rumbles, communication failures (naturally) and the emergence of a mysterious fog, dismal even by the standards of Aberdeen. Naturally, adding to the murk is an evil profit seeking multinational corporation and you just know they are going to be up to their necks in it. Oh yes, they knew!



Bonnar’s character is clearly key here. He wears spectacles at the end of his nose and reads books, which in the language of TV drama marks him out as some kind of sage or straight out fecking genius. Moreover, what’s that book he is reading? Good Lord, it’s only The Kraken Wakes, by John Wyndham. Could this be a clue? And just in case we miss it he is seen reading the book again and then we see it on his desk until you want to shout ‘Ok! I get it! Sea monsters! From the deep!’

Meanwhile actor who was in Line of Duty and everything else does his Line of Duty character and the woman who was in Line of Duty plays a medic in this but then seems to flip into her Line of Duty character and start biffing people, while Iain Glen impersonates a large lump of granite and Owen Teale plays a rabble rouser so annoying that the only compensation is that he must surely die soon.

In fact such is the who’s who of UK TV acting you end up anticipating Stephen Graham being winched aboard at some point.

But why are films about oil rigs great TV and film, from Dr Who to that Michael Caine effort? Because they are isolated and spooky and because they reliably blow up. It’s my strong guess the latter is where we are headed.

 

Started Rogue Heroes the other night. Not particularly well versed in SAS history, so couldn’t say how true to reality it is, but without being able to quite put my finger on why I like it, I’ve enjoyed each episode so far. Great sound track as well.

 

Not seen it, but my obsession with the former Yugoslavia led me to read Eastern Approaches by Fitzroy Maclean who was one of the first SAS officers. Fantastic read.

 

Thank your sir, I’ll be watching that next week.

Just ordered myself a copy, thanks for the recommendation.

 

Hancock on Gold now.
Priceless.

 

The best thing on the telly now is Minder (ITV4 most weekday afternoons). Absolutely superb acting and script.

 

There speaks a man with too much time on his hands.

 

I record it. Honestly

 

One of the worst films I've ever seen and I've seen House Bunny

 

I had a phase of enjoying Channel 5’s endless reruns of The Sweeney.

Shut it you slag! Bang ‘im up George!

 

??

 

It’s really good. Typical Ken Burns, of course.

While this didn’t teach me much that I didn’t already know, thanks to the subject matter it will never not be heartbreaking, fascinating or unbelievable*.

What I love about his documentaries are the threads of personal, small stories threaded through the greater narrative, which is always told will crystal clear clarity. To the point without ever being cold.

*Not in that way, obviously.

 

GTFI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

How the Holocaust Began BBC Two is a very interesting, though highly distressing account of how the Holocaust gathered momentum.

The programme describes that the death camps were the outcome of a series of mass killings following the German occupations of Eastern Europe. Four, quite small, German death squads were tasked with killing Jewish people in the aftermath of the German Army’s advance. They provided the catalyst for local people across the Baltic states and Eastern Europe to organise their own killings. The slaughter was later industrialised.

It’s a deeply unhappy watch, but an essential thing to understand.

 

Currently binging Orphan Black on All 4. Watched the first couple of seasons on BBC before it got poached by I think Netflix.

All about human cloning. The main actress does a cedible job of portraying multiple people and accents.

Rumours of a Spin off series in the pipeline also. Worht a watch if you like sciency crime thriller stuff.

 

The first non-academic publication into this area was Christopher Browning's "Ordinary Men" written after the extensive Eastern European archives were opened to historians. It gives some insights into the 'why?' and debunks an awful lot of myths about the 'who?'. The killing squads weren't highly indoctrinated fanatical SS troops but 'ordinary' coppers drafted in Police Battalions. I say ordinary coppers as they've looked at the percentage of Nazi party membership in the various "uniformed" services and way, way down the list come the coppers (ISTR there was a higher percentage of 'true believers' in the postal service and public transport than the police) - the Nazis got round this by making the police part of the SS in 1942(?).

I'm assuming the TV show focuses on Reserve Police Battalion 101 whose activities actually had to be reigned-in by direct request of the Wehrmacht as their actions were having a affect on the troops morale and behaviour.

FWIW I was in Vilnius when it was first published with an awful lot of Americans (and Jocks) of Lithuanian descent - publication of that book put a whole new meaning into their claims that their fathers/grandfathers were 'just' (auxiliary) policemen during the war...

 

Black Bird on Apple TV is brilliant.

 

I watched about 3 episodes of that and thought it had been written by a 15 year old for their GCSE English, made with a budget of £50.

 

So good

 

Paul Walter Hauser is absolutely incredible as Larry, mesmerising and terrifying.

 

Nobody watching The Last of Us?

 

Visually impressive for about 30 minutes in the it’s all kicking off phase. Then just very silly, with poor acting and tedious characters.

Zombies are a bit crap really. All that woooaarghing. What’s their motivation? How come they never run out of puff?

 

I’ve just been binging Happy Valley as well, I do like it but I’ve just finished the second series and I found that very predictable compared to the first, managed to call everything that was going to happen before it did.

 

Yes. Completely compelling, visually fantastic and the performances are as expected from such an amazing cast. Although it took me an episode to get used to a different looking Ellie compared to the game version. Pascal was born to play Joel but he’s such a talented actor, he can pretty much play anyone with his eyes closed.

The Bill and Frank episode will go down as one the greatest tv episodes ever. Just give them all the awards now. Druckmann and Mazin have set a new standard in TV, much like the game set new standards in that world.

 

Is that ep03 which seems to be generating wall-2-wall superlative coverage - we were supposed to start watching this series last night but GK training wasn't called off (although it was stopped after just over an hour due to the pitch freezing over)...

 

Yes, lots of spoilers out there about episode 3 so watch as soon as you can. As we have very similar tastes in TV, I’m sure you’ll love it.

 

I can't bear northerners.

 

My oh did say at the start she didn’t like it because it reminded her of Emmerdale.