Light the blue touchpaper and stand well back

Well Torchwood has finally hit our screens. After a year of build-up, with mentions throughout the last series of Doctor Who, they hype really started about a month ago. There were teasers and then proper trailers, posters everywhere and decorated buses. It was very reminiscent of the return of Doctor Who last year.

But did the show live up to the hype? In a word, no. The premier on BBC3 of the first two episodes back to back (repeated on BBC2 the following Wednesday) meant nearly two hours of viewing and I have to say I was loosing interest towards the end of the second episode. Maybe I was just getting tired? The idea of the story is good and there seemed to be a good mix of serious plot and humour we’ve come to expect from Russell T Davies’s Who. I was impressed enough to continue watching, especially for all the gorgeous Welsh accents! I’m hoping it’s a grower.

The big gripe with the programme seems to be that it is an adult programme, with adult content. As far as I’m concerned I don’t see what the problem is (possibly because I don’t have children). It was always going to be an adult spin-off and everything I’ve read has emphasised this point. Yes it was heavily advertised, and trailers might have gone out at times that children would have seen them, but this happens with a lot of post watershed programmes, Spooks being an example that springs to mind. I think the major problems seems to be the programme’s association with Doctor Who. There seem to be a lot of parents saying their kids wanted to watch it because it was a Doctor Who spin-off and that such an adult programme shouldn’t be associated with a kids’ programme. Since when has Doctor Who been a kids’ programme? As far as I know it is, and always has been, a programme for all the family. Now there’s a branch just for the adults, and next year there’ll be a branch for the kids (Sarah Jane Adventures) which probably won’t suit my taste in television viewing, but it’s not aimed at me, so I won’t worry. I think the big point is that television after 9pm isn’t aimed at children, so parents shouldn’t complain that it’s not suitable.

Rant over!

It’s Sad, so sad …

I read yesterday that Dr Wally had died. It’s a sad day for radio.

Strictly Shocking!

Spoony and Ola are out! I blame that old mid-table, they’ll be safe voting mentality. The judges scores have saved the top few couples and the public save the bottom few, leaving the ones in the middle to lose. It’s a shame as they were much better than some of the remaining couples, but then it wouldn’t be Strictly without some shock exits.

Out of my previous picks, both Ray and Camilla and Mark and Karen proved that they can be as good at ballroom as they were at latin. Peter Schmeichel and his partner Erin Boag were very good at the tango. They’ve yet to dance a latin dance, and I think they’ll cope with next week’s Paso Doble, but I worry how he’ll cope with the bouncier latin dances which seem to suit shorter people. We’ll have to wait and see. Of the girls, Carol and Matthew were ok, although not as good as I expected from last week, but they could still be a slow burner to watch out for. Louisa and Vincent blew away the rest of the competition with a fantastic jive which earned them the first 10 of the series.

And it had been confirmed that Jimmy Tarbuck has had to pull out of the competition due to his health, which is sad, but understandable. Although the question is now how they cope with the extra week created by technically losing two couples this week … ?

Cooking Up A Treat

BBC4 Showed a wonderful interview with Marguerite Patten yesterday evening.  It was in the usual Mark Lawson Talks to slot and I was impressed as to how much in control Marguerite was. She wasn’t standing for any messing from Mark Lawson, even when he pressed her about convenience and fast food. I think he was expecting her to condemn it, but she said that she could see a place for it in busy lives, but it needed supplementing with vegetables or whatever in order to gain the proper nutritional balance. Also I was impressed with her refusing to name any specific products throughout the interview. Here’s someone who knows how to avoid product placement!

The interview itself was facinating, as I knew that Marguerite had worked for the Ministry of Food during the war and had become thetelevision cook during the 1950s, but I knew very little else about her personally. I have admired her cooking for many years and her cookbooks grace my shelves, as they did for my grandparents. Her wartime sense of making meals out of very little was a godsend during my student days. I even went through a phase of wanting to be a home economist like her (although I had many career aspirations when I was nine!). She came across as a very clear headed, down to earth lady who is still going strong into her 90s. I only hope I can be even a little like her if I get to that age.

I’m Staying In

I’ve been enjoying the first couple of episodes of a new sitcom on BBC1 called Not Going Out. It stars Lee Mack, Tim Vine and Megan Dodds and is written by Mack and Andrew Collins (who I only knew from the Radio Times and odd radio programmes!). It’s really good to have a sitcom which relies on goo, funny jokes and one liners. It’s been a long time since I’ve laughed out loud this much at new comedy.

Strictly’s Back

Strictly Come Dancing’s back – bigger and better than before. (If it gets any bigger it’ll be on all year!) Ok, so yes, it was back last week, but I wanted to see all the couples dance before posting my comments.

As there are so many couples this year they decided to have only the men celebrities dancing on the first programme and the women on the second, which made them feel a lot less rushed than previous series. The first week the men danced either a Cha cha cha or a waltz. The ones which stood out for me were Ray Fearon with Camilla Dallerup and Mark Ramprakash with Karen Hardy. I have been thinking that it could have something to do with both Camilla and Karen being very good at choreographing fun routines which show their partner’s strengths. Having said that, they both seemed to have a good natural dancing ability.

Week two was the girls turn, with either a quickstep or a rumba. I always think the rumba is difficult to get right, especially so early on in the competition, so it wasn’t surprising that the three girls who danced it were placed at the bottom of the judges scoring. The performances which stood out for me were Louisa Lytton with Vincent Simone and Carol Smilie with Matthew Cuttler. They both did very good quicksteps, despite nerves and they both seemed to have enjoyed the dancing. They were both beaten to the top place by Emma Buton and Darren Bennett, but as I was expecting Emma to be good, her dancing wasn’t so memorable for me.

It will be interesting to see how the dancers I have picked fare next week, when the good ballroom dancers are doing latin and vice verca. To survive the competition they need to be good at both.

Mocking Week

I was lucky enough to be at the recording of Mock the Week last week – my first visit to the old ‘Concrete Doughnut’ since moving down here! The show was great. I usually enjoy watching it on the telly, but it was even better to see the unedited form. It was so much funnier to see all the comedians without the constraints of libel or language censorship with the broadcast programme has to be concerned with. Also there’s a lot more comedy in two hours than there is in a half hour programme.

The recording also made me realise just how funny Hugh Dennis can be. I was harking back to the old days of the Milky Milky tour with Steve Punt, when I suddenly realised how long ago that must have been (when I was still at school and my mate fancied Rob Newman, so we’d have this big Mary Whitehouse divide)

It was fun to watch the programme on Thursday night, with my accompanying comments of “oh, they cut that bit”, “I can’t believe they left that in” and “ah, they used that take”. Great stuff!