Category: Television

Tom Baker Shada Unvailable in US iTunes Store

This morning I was astonished to see an article in The Guardian stating that the BBC planned to release the completed version of the long lost Doctor Who episode ‘Shada’ today on the iTunes store. The episode from 1979 was abandoned (until now) due to a BBC strike and has been a sort of white whale for those of us who count actor Tom Baker as Continue reading Tom Baker Shada Unvailable in US iTunes Store

Will CBS Repeat the Mistakes of Star Trek: Enterprise?

This spring I ran into an “old friend” on one of those retro cable channels and was so enamored by the encounter that I decided to fire up Netflix and devote some serious binge time to catching up on Star Trek: Enterprise and worrying about the new Star Trek series currently in production.

If you’re not a fan of the Star Trek franchise you’re probably not even reading this sentence so I’m not going to spend a lot of time on a lengthy explanation about a show you probably already know. Put simply for those fans who haven’t seen it, this series documented Earth’s earliest exploration of deep space using our planet’s newly developed Continue reading Will CBS Repeat the Mistakes of Star Trek: Enterprise?

Designated Auditor: Ben Carson Discovers Secret $500 Billion! Not.

This past September a friend told me about a new ABC action series she’d started watching called “Designated Survivor” starring Jack Bauer. I mean, she didn’t say that it starred Jack Bauer, she said that it starred Kiefer Sutherland, but since I can never remember the character’s name from this new show it’s just easier for me to call him Jack Bauer.

In the first episode we find out that Jack has been serving as the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development and is an expert on a wide range of complex policy matters that most Americans can’t be bothered to understand because we’re way too busy blogging about television shows.

So anyway.

In the first episode some mysterious bad guys blow up Continue reading Designated Auditor: Ben Carson Discovers Secret $500 Billion! Not.

The Making of “You Wouldn’t Believe Our World”

Back in my college years the talk show Late Night with David Letterman was a delightfully subversive, highly imaginative way to end the day. The writers were whip smart and the bits they did would have become viral sensations if today’s socially networks had existed back then. The other night I was out having a few beers with a friend ten years my junior who had missed out on the imaginative era of David Letterman and I mentioned a mock commercial that I often think about, whose title eluded Continue reading The Making of “You Wouldn’t Believe Our World”

Enterprise: Unsung Gem of the Star Trek Universe

star_trek_enterprise_001

Five minutes ago I finished watching the final episode of Star Trek: Enterprise, a series which I have binged from beginning to end over the past three weeks. Despite the fact that I’m 9 years late to the party (its last episode aired in May of 2005), Enterprise is now my favorite Star Trek series after the original.

Here are some things that helped to turn me into a fan of the show:

  • production design was all about practicality – most of the time things had a limit, for instance the ship (Enterprise NX-01) was almost always outclassed by the ships of alien races
  • using jumpsuits for uniforms was a perfect wardrobe decision which helped demonstrate the transition from our current period of space exploration to the time of Continue reading Enterprise: Unsung Gem of the Star Trek Universe

Winning The Late Night Twitter War

Late Night Twitter War

Did you know that the Late Night Wars have gone online? I didn’t. I only found out yesterday.

Last weekend I went to see late night talk show host Craig Ferguson “in concert” at the Cobb Energy Center, a poor man’s Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. While it was great fun to see my Twitter-pal @CraigyFerg live and in person, I was surprised to find myself annoyed at his incessant cursing. I, mean, it’s not like I don’t use foul language in my regular every day life, I’m just as clay-footed as the next person – – but there really was some part of my intellect which stood up primly and declared (in a Craig Ferguson sort of way) “Cursing? Reeeeally??”

It was disappointing to watch this clearly clever man employ a comedic “mutually assured destruction” with the dreaded F-bomb.

I considered sending a tweet to @CraigyFerg to tell him that I thought he’d be just as funny if he could cut his cursing back by 35% but I knew better than to waste my time because he has such an enormous group of followers (which he calls his “skeleton robot Continue reading Winning The Late Night Twitter War

David Gregory, Man or Monster?

David Gregory Threatens to Annihilate Al and Meredith
Has anyone else noticed how big ‘Meet the Press’ host David Gregory has become lately? I’m not talking about “fat”, I’m talking about TALL. The man is enormous!! A 2003-2006 report from the Center for Disease Control reported [warning:PDF] that the average height of American citizens is five feet, four point three inches (5′-4.3″). Using a screen grab of this morning’s program (shown above) it’s obvious that Gregory towers over his co-hosts. If we assume that Al Roker and Meredith Vieira are average height (and not in fact taller, which is entirely possible) it’s short work with a slide rule to see that the man’s true height is pushing Continue reading David Gregory, Man or Monster?

Yu-Gi-Oh Versus Netflix? Message Reveived!

Yu-Gi-Oh versus Netflix

Oh Netflix, you sexy little minx, you conduit to all my guilty pleasures, you must be nearly as exhausted as I am… or maybe you kids started celebrating New Years a little early this year? All I know is that after 15 hours of slinging pixels I arrived home, ready to crank open a little bit of Yu-Gi-Oh style monster-dueling before hitting the sack and five seconds into the disc I realized that you didn’t sent me Volume 8 and 9 like I requested, you sent me Volumes 9 and 10, which might seem Continue reading Yu-Gi-Oh Versus Netflix? Message Reveived!

Finally Firefly

A little while ago I powered down the DVD player and pulled myself up from the couch, having finished watching a Christmas gift to myself: a 4-disc set of the television show called Firefly. Although I have a few more of the DVD extras left to watch, I’m in the mood to post my thoughts about the show at this moment because I finally understand the passion that drives the show’s fans and wanted to tell my friends who don’t care for science fiction that you need to see the 14 original episodes of this show.
Continue reading Finally Firefly