Mickey and Davie's TV Rant

2009-07-11T19:08:00.002Z

Hello. Hello. Is there anyone out there??

Hey dear readers and loyal fans. I can only apologise for the lack of posting in recent days/weeks/months. There is no excuse for it. But to be honest it got really busy with a lot of good TV coming to an end at the same time and Mickey and I had to say our goodbyes to favourites like ER, The Shield and Mickey's personal favourite, Prison Break. Quite how they managed to stretch that into a fourth series and then a made for TV film I will never know - but I hope they guy that persuaded the TV station to buy it was given a generous bonus.

So what are we watching over the summer?? I am resisting the temptation to watch old episodes of the Bill on Alibi (tho I am very excited about the new-look Bill with HD and music and stuff) and have been watching the first series of Big Bang Theory on DVD and Masterchef. Now if any of our readers ever lie awake at night wondering what Mickey from Mickey and Davies TV rant looks and acts like - maybe you should be watching Big Bang as well...................

Great to be back.

Apprentice Series Five. Pick Your Winner

2009-03-22T14:23:00.012Z

Finally, the wait is over. The Apprentice is back on Wednesday. But more importantly, this sees the return of the most popular no prized competition in the history of humanity. Yes. It's time for this year's Mickey and Davie's TV Rant's Who Is Going To Win The Apprentice (Based Purely On Appearance Remember) competition.

And here are the fifteen we've got to choose from:

Over the past few days I've been collecting initial entries from people I've seen in real life. Anyone who still reads this rubbish and who wants to join in the fun (and believe me, it really is a whole lot of fun) feel free to leave a comment and I'll make sure your entry is logged. Please remember though, there are no prizes, and if you leave your comment after the first episode has aired then your vote won't count and you may still be charged.

I myself thought long and hard before deciding on my winner. Last year I incorrectly thought it was going to be Jenny Celeriac (or whatever her name is). I should have realised that it was a mistake seeing as I've got some sort of intolerence with all things that begin with celer-. (It's not an allergy, but believe me, it's still very unpleasant).

But this year, I still think it's going to be a lady, and I'm going for the one on the right at the front with the big curly hair.

She'll annoy me, and I'll not want her to win, but Sir Alan will like her no nonsense in your face attitude and her inability to recognise her own weaknesses.

Davie has decided to go for James. He's the blokey on the far right, next to the beauty queen. He looks a bit too smug for my liking. A little bit cocky. I don't like him myself.

Last year, Mrs Davie went for Kevin, the Matt Lucas lookalike who I think may have been the most incompetent man on television. His incompetence was only matched by his lack of self-awareness. As a result, Mrs Davie will not be choosing this year. Last year's shame still hurts.

Friend of Mickey and Davie's TV Rant GP usually picks the one who is first out. And by picking Lorraine, I think he'll keep up his losing streak. Yes, she's wearing glasses, but so did Andy in series 3, and we know what happened to him.

Young Joe, Friend of Mickey and Davie's TV Rant GP's son, is a bit of a ladies man, and has gone for Kate, while his mother (who likes to keep things local) has gone for Philip, an Estate Agent from Co Durham.

Finally, to Stannaz and Mrs Stannaz. Stannaz and I think alike (apart from Stannaz being a huge fan of all things beginning with celer-). He's gone for Paula, like me. His wife, Mrs Stannaz is a big fan of sandwiches, Middlesbrough and boxing films and so has gone for Rocky, the sandwich chain owner from Teesside.

So there you have it. Possibly the dullest thing I've ever written, although look back over the past couple of years worth of ramblings and you may be able to find an entry that will prove me wrong.

End credits

2009-03-08T18:33:00.004Z

One of the things I like to do when watching a television programme is watch the end credits all the way through. I've enjoyed the programme therefore I shall honour the makers by reading their names. It's something I've done for years. That way I know that Sid Sutton did the theme music arrangement on Doctor Who during Tom Baker's last season, and while I don't know what Mykola Pawluk actually does, I do know that that particular individual has worked on lots of television programmes since my childhood.

Credits of course are normally ruined these days by continuity announcers telling us what's on next and what's on BBC2 and what's on BBC3, and what's on the iPlayer. They're annoying and are ruining society.

But none are more annoying and are ruining society more than the complete tool who talks over the end credits on Sky One programmes. I believe his name is Talky Billy. It's bad enough that I've got to put up with Iggy Pop selling me car insurance during Battlestar Galactica, but then to have this chirpy, hey I'm your friend, cock trying to make me watch something completely inappropriate just irks me real bad.

There is absolutely no pause once the programme's finished. The closing seconds have not even left the screen on 24 when the jovial arse starts spouting his annoying crap:

"Before you go and see Gran Torino, see a slightly less craggy Clint getting "In the Line of Fire" available now on Anytime TV as paart of the Clint Eastwood week on Sky Movies Modern Greats."

First of all, Talky Billy, I'm not going to see Gran Torino. Second of all, even if I was, why would I want to watch a film with Clint Eastwood in, simply because I'm going to see another film with Clint Eastwood in? I'd understand if it was a sequel or something. But it's not. I could just as easily watch the entire back catalogue of episodes of "Spenser: for Hire" as Brian Howe (who is also in Gran Torino) plays a cab driver in the 1988 episode Hawk's Eyes (Hawk of course played by Benjamin Sisko from Star Trek Deep Space Nine). But I won't. "Eeh, ah'm off tae see a film with the bloke from that other film, so ah'll watch that other film first!" Credit me with some form of freewill. I refuse to be that predictable.

So Talky Billy has already insulted me by suggesting that I might want to watch an old film. But we're not even halfway through the credits yet.

"So, next week it's a double episode of 24 as total Hollywood legend Jon Voight returns to [and here he gets particularly annoying] sti....ir it up."

Granted, knowing that it's a double episode is useful. But why tell me that Jon Voight returns? We're into episode eight or nine already. How many people, honestly, how many people does Talky Billy think there are that have watched this episode of 24 and were not going to watch the next but then changed their minds based on Talky Billy telling us that total Hollywood legend Jon Voight is going to be in it? None. It's not necessary.

When someone buys the boxed set DVD do they need some arse talking over the credits of each episode telling them what's coming up in the next episode otherwise they'll just never watch the next episode?? Do they???

Still a few seconds of the credits to go.

"And next tonight, while you're tucked up with your teddy bear, they're working the toughest shift of the lot. Brand new Night Cops."

And he paused a little bit just to make sure that his voice over lasted the exact length of the credits. Thirty seconds of my life completely ruined.

My anger is misdirected of course. It's not Talky Billy who is at fault here. Somewhere upstairs in Sky HQ is a fat cat sitting on his fat behind writing memos thinking what a great idea it is to have Talky Billy talking over the end credits (Fat Cat Frankie I think his name is). And he'll have got a six figure bonus because of it. And because the media is controlled by Rupert Murdoch we never get to hear about him, it's poor innocent bankers like Fred Goodwin who get vilified and poor defenseless Peter Mandelson who gets custard thrown on him.

But I won't be swayed by Fat Cat Frankie. I shall keep watching the end credits, saluting each and every brave soul who has put their heart into making this programme. I might turn the sound down though.

Hustle

2009-02-26T22:23:00.002Z

I have surprised myself dear readers. Having cleared down some old episodes of Lost Series 3 from my sky plus box a few weeks ago I decided to record some random stuff. Fringe and Breaking Bad, both on the recommendation of Mickey. Both have been deleted after watching 2 episodes of each. One a sci-fi step too far for me, the other just depressing. I also took the liberty of recording BBC1's Hustle. This was against my better judgement.
A. It was recommended by everyone's favourite compliance accountant and good friend of this column/blog, Cuddles.
B. It stars Matt di Angelo and Robert Vaughan, neither of whom have entertained me greatly in the past 37 years

I am now a huge Hustle fan. I find myself reading old plot lines on Wikipedia and am scouring Amazon and E Bay for DVD box sets of Series 1-4. I don't know why I like it so much. It's ok, the storylines have holes the size of my guns in them and the acting is hardly RSC standard but it is strangely addictive. Maybe the Benton Bag lady can help me with this conundrum???

Heroes The Next Generation

2009-02-24T15:22:00.004Z

You wouldn't believe how busy I've been. You see, when I got back from holiday it turned out that I had only 3% free on my Sky + box which meant that I had to spend all of November and December catching up.

Obviously over Christmas all good television stopped, so I would have been able to write stuff then, but I had git loads of work to do.

I'm now having a week's holiday involving me trying to tidy my house and catching up with a lot of television.

So last night I got a chance to watch episode 13 of series 3 (or episode 1 of season 3b if you like that sort of thing) of Heroes.

Had I been able to get off my lazy behind and blog over the last couple of months I would have registered my moderate displeasure at the whole first half of series three. It was all fairly ropey. Confused, too many things happening, uncertain motivations, what Arthur Petrelli's powers actually were, Sylar turning good then turning bad again, it was generally poor.

So the new thing started and it all just looks like the same characters going through the motions. Honestly, in series one Sylar was exciting and evil and a great character. When I saw Sylar in last night's episode I just felt tired.

It seems as though each series of Heroes has become like an episode of Star Trek. No matter what happens in the episode (series) at the end of it, it'll all be back to normal. Unless they're planning something different in the next thirteen episodes, series four will start off with the same core characters doing the same old stuff.

The likes of Lost, BSG, hell even Prison Break, have an ongoing story line throughout the whole of the show's run. And while it can be a little frustrating when you're watching early episodes of Lost where all you want to do is find out what's in the hatch and they're trying to fob you off with yet another episode exploring Jack's relationship with his Dad, you can forgive them when every episode now seems to genuinely force the story ahead to a conclusion.

With Heroes, no matter happens I feel as though the story is being pushed towards a conclusion which will involve some disappointing showdown where they all get involved, maybe Sylar will be a goodie this time, maybe a baddie, and at the end of it it'll all be back to normal ready for the next episode.

Maybe series 4 will be the Chinatown episode, where Peter, Matt and Sylar have to help a young couple who own a shop fight some unscrupulous gangsters who want to knock the shop down for a new hotel, meanwhile Clare and Nathan Petrelli get trapped on the holodeck by Professor Moriarty and Hiro falls in love with another woman who's about to die.

Hello there

2009-02-19T22:58:00.002Z

HAPPY NEW YEAR dear readers. Mickey and Davie are back. Yes baby, just like the great 80's pop band Spandau Ballet, Mickey and I have put pur differences behind us, decided on a fair 50/50 split on the royalties for this column and are now in serious training for what promises to be a very exciting 2009. Forget the troubled economic times my friends. Don't worry about quantitive easing, it's all about 24, The Shield, Lost, Damages, The Bill and the last 5 episodes of Prison Break. Starting from tomorrow as I am bit tired now and am heading off to bed.

PS Big thanks to Cuddles for masterminding our comeback - without you big man - none of this would have been written.

What has Mickey been up to?

2008-11-06T19:23:00.003Z

You see, what happened was, it was like October, right? And I was all ready to write something about the Saturday night More 4 drama John Adams. So I turned on my television to watch an episode so that it could inspire words to come out of my brain and onto the screen, when I accidentally caught a glimpse of Hole In The Wall.

The shock put me in a coma for the past four weeks.

Not really! I've just been really lazy and I've been on holiday! Yes. And here is what I did on my holiday:

I went to South Africa. I saw some animals. I had a turbulent flight where I thought I would die, but I didn't. I met a couple of girls in Cape Town who took me to a late bar, but I was getting tired, so I made my excuses and left.

And that is what I did on my holiday.

Can I just take this opportunity to apologise to anyone and everyone who has read this blog and may read about this blog in the future, in respect of my earlier comment about being in a coma. It was in very poor taste, it was not at all funny, and I did not mean to offend anyone who may themselves be in a coma or may know someone or know of someone who is in a coma.

For this reason, I have decided to resign immediately from Mickey and Davie's TV Rant. Everyone has my sincere and very sincere apologies. I would like to ask you all now one last favour. Please leave Davie alone. It wasn't his fault that I wrote those things. Yes, he may have been sitting in the background goading me, but I'm the one what wrote them words.

Please stop this constant media hounding of a basically good man, misguided yes, a little stupid maybe, but a decent man nonetheless who only ever wanted to make people happy, to make the world smile. A fundamentally caring man can no longer step outside of his house to take his dog for a walk without being hounded by at least three photographers clammering for a shot of his shattered tearstained eyes, his face betraying the guilt of a man who knows he made a stupid mistake.

Instead, these people should go round Jeremy Clarkson's house, because those things he said about truck drivers were unforgiveable. Traitor!! Terrorist!!! Kill him!! etc.

I am really enjoying John Adams though.

Wednesday nights

2008-10-15T18:59:00.002Z

Ah I love Wednesday. Half of the week is over and of course at 8 pm there is tv gold in the form of the restaurant. I know, I know, it clashes with the Bill but record the Bill and watch it the way God intended , on a Sunday morning with a nice cup of coffee. Quite where they found this years candidates for the Restaurant, I have no idea. Did Raymond Blanc stand in the middle of a town with a billboard "dumbasess please come here and sign up for my new series"? There are now only 4 couples left - 2 who can win - the lad who wears purple and his "effervescent" mrs, and the couple that basically serve up home made food, serve it with a smile and then charge you restaurant prices. I like both couples and surely Raymond is only ever going to invest his money with one of these couples. Being the best couples means they are not as entertaining though. The entertainment now comes from James and Alistair. James is about 25 and can cook. However he is being portrayed as possibly the biggest bully since Adolf Hitler and his treatment of simpering Alistair has to be seen to be believed. They are describe as childhood friends. I can only assume that means James bullied Alastair at primary school and has decided to dedicate his life to perfecting that art. Alastair for his part is madly in love with James and clearly values any form of attention even if it is a sharp kick in the bollocks. In last weeks episode, Alastair had a mini-breakdown and conceivably was thinking of suicide as the dinner party they were catering for threatened to turn into a huge disaster. As he curled up in the corner sobbing his heart out, good old James was trying to perfect his Ali G routine by clicking his fingers and shouting "booyakasha" whilst at the same time dressing a tomato salad with a nice balsamic dressing. Tv gold my friends. Watch it.

Mickey is on holiday by the way. I might write some more tomorrow if I can be bothered.

Not really worth the wait

2008-09-15T17:30:00.003Z

I turned on my television last night to see that my prayers had finally been answered. Suddenly here was a television show to do my 46" screen justice.

Move aside High Definition Dexter. Farewell The Restaurant. Sling your hook UKtv Drama repeats of Tom Baker era Doctor Who. There's a new show in town, and it is about to rock our world.

Ever since I gave up on the idea of 3-D television I've been a huge fan of old school variety. You know, a bit of a song here, a bit of a dance there, maybe a musical number, mixed up with some family friendly stand up, with a pretty lady showing a bit of leg singing a song for the Dads.

I've also been a big fan of Vernon Kay. The tall man from Bolton has long been a guarantee of quality early evening entertainment, Just The Two Of Us, Hit Me Baby One More Time, All Star Family Fortunes, that one where you've got to beat the celebrity. And his overplayed accent is priceless, reminiscent of Cilla on Blind Date.

But of course my favourite thing in the whole world is the outrageous Joan Rivers. Ever since she was introduced to me in her outrageous chat show Can We Talk? I've been fan of her outrageous comedy and the way she says outrageous things. Honestly, some of the things she says are outrageous!

Put them all together and you should have television gold. He's tall and a bit cheeky, she's outrageous and the things she says are outrageous, the sexual chemistry should be electric. Welcome to For One Night Only.

And yet, and yet. Somehow it didn't work. It all seemed a little contrived. When I found out that "The Jersey Boys" were going to be on, singing a special set of tunes especially for the television show, I could have cried with anticipation. But when they came on, it was all I could do to stop vomiting.

Was it too much of a good thing? It sort of reminded me of way back in 1993, when my three favourite things were Doctor Who, EastEnders and of course 3-D television. The special Doctor Who episode, Dimensions in Time, which had the Doctor, joining the cast of EastEnders, all filmed in 3-D seemed like the best television programme ever. It looked so good on paper. How could it fail? And yet, and yet.

Never mind July - what about August

2008-09-04T19:10:00.002Z

Many apologies to what is left of our dwindling fan base for the lack of material to brighten your lives in the past few months. I too disgust myself. I have been so busy enjoying the great British summer to watch any TV. It has been one long string of beach parties, bbq's and surfboarding. Oh and I changed internet provider and it took a while to work. Good old sky.

Anyway -what has Davie been watching I hear you muse. Well of course my dear friends I have been watching the same old trite that I normally watch, Eastenders(ok), the Bill (brilliant as usual) and my old favourite Dragons Den is back. DD appears to have become a split camp between with Pete and his old mucker Theo on one side and dozy Dunc and the recruitment bloke on the other. All 4 are scared of Deborah so she does not need to take sides. If their is an investable proposition then Pete and Theo will outbid and outcharm Dunc and let's call the other bloke Jimmy. Time after time Dunc and Jimmy look really sad after being gazumped by Pete and Theo. Of course P&T do not always invest - when they do declare themselves out, it is great to see the look of delight on Duncs face. He will then make an offer which is often accepted but then he looks along the line to see P&T doubled up with laughter after seen him throw another £100k into a pointless venture. It is like watching a kitten drown - cruel but strangely you find yourself unable to turn away.

That's all for now - let's hope Mickey gets off his lazy backside and blogs soon

What happened to July?

2008-08-06T17:48:00.003Z

Good grief. I didn't post in July. I disgust myself sometimes. What a nasty lazy layabout I am. I could vomit with shame.

Excuses? I wasn't on holiday. I haven't stopped watching television. My computer still works. I have no excuse other than my own pitiful crapness.

Anyway, enough about me. What about my new telly?

Yes. I've got a new telly. My old one broke. Three years into its life it decided to go all snowy, and I couldn't watch anything. So I've bought a new one. It's bigger and has that high definition thing and has a five year guarantee in case it decides to break in three years time.

And what have I been watching on my lovely new television?

Nothing really. Television has never been so bad.

When Dragons' Den is the highlight of the week, you know you're in trouble. First couple of series were great. All business and I'm not going to invest and it's a Den first and just so you know I'm out and remember if the hopefuls must receive an offer for all of the investment they ask for or they won't get anything and just so you know I'm out. Great stuff.

But it bores me now. It's all the same. Four main pitches, the first or second will receive an offer which may or may not be accepted. The third doesn't. The fourth does, often in a dramatic turn of events. You know it's a dramatic turn of events because Evan tells us. "In a dramatic turn of events..." he says. He'll follow it up by "It's a Den first."

One thing that has changed this series is that Peter Jones is no longer described as "One of Britain's best known entrepreneurs". What's that all about? Has he become less well known over the past twelve months? Or maybe he realised that it made him sound like a bit of a precious tool.

Dragons Den of course is not the best programme on television at the moment. That falls to Dexter on FX. I never got to see the first series until it was repeated on ITV a couple of months ago. Excellent stuff. It appears that FX is the only channel to actually show good drama at this time of year. It's also got the Wire. I'm not watching that though as I'm watching it on DVD and I'm only onto series 3.

I did try watching a couple of episodes of The Unit. It looks great on paper. David Mamet (Glengarry Glen Ross), Shawn Ryan (The Shield) as Executive Producers and sometimes writers, Dennis Haysbert (off of 24) as the main blokey, good supporting cast including that blokey from Terminator 2 and the later series of the X Files.

It was rubbish! How can the bloke who created the Shield have anything to do with this tripe? It's all husbands and wives arguing, and wives arguing with each other and husbands going off somewhere to shoot people and it ends with what can only be described as an unashamedly anti-French musical number which made me cringe more than the Apprentice.

Maybe I watched a bad episode, but come on! You wouldn't find Starbuck and Boomer singing anti-French songs on Battlestar Galactica.

F word on Channel 4

2008-07-09T21:52:00.002Z

F word on Channel 4
Watched it
Nothing else on TV
Not since..
Heroes
Finished

Watch it again ?
No chance.
Conversing like this
My new style

How Dare They

2008-06-30T18:13:00.003Z

I would have posted long long before now, but for the fact that there is nothing on television.

Just a few weeks ago my Sky plus box was close to full capacity. There was BSG, Lost, Mad Men, Apprentice, Doctor Who, Heroes, Reaper (which I quite enjoyed), Pushing Daisies (which I didn't enjoy but felt as though I had to stick it out to the end), Peep Show etc. I had lots to watch. Life was good.

Now there's only Who and Heroes, and they're both finishing next week. My Sky plus box is empty. This is why Big Brother is popular. It's the only thing on television.

But my main reason for writing today is not to complain about the lack of television. It is to inform our many many fans of one of the most extraordinary shows I have ever seen.

I am talking of course about Who Dares Sings, on ITV on Saturday night.

I turned over by accident last Saturday during takeaway night at Mickey's, and was accosted by Ben Shephard and Denise van Outen asking the audience to all sing We Are Family. The audience were ecstatic, punching the air, grabbing their microphones and clapping like the hundred goons that they are.

Then the song started, and they all stood up, all swinging their shoulders and arms in time to the music (I believe this is called dancing) holding the microphones like they're proper singers, and belting the words out like they've been shot full of some hallucinogenic drug that makes them think they're Meat Loaf.

Denise is going round the audience with her own microphone, grabbing on to people and singing with them as though this is the way that humanity acts all the time. Gawping at the camera and emphasising the words to show that these particular audience members that she has just met are in fact all of her sisters that she has got with her.

Ben's at the front looking a little awkward seeing a hundred wild eyed audience members bellowing out Sister Sledge at him, but even he's still giving it plenty of beans.

No one in the audience seemed to have any self awareness. There was no one on the sidelines looking a little bit sheepish, a little bit shy. Everyone was giving it absolutely everything they had. None of the participants seemed to have any concept of embarrassment, shame or regret.

God. It was excrutiating. I've never been so ashamed, embarrassed, shocked, disturbed. I'm not ITV's biggest fan, but my life! This was an abomination!

I'll definitely watch it again.

S4

2008-06-14T16:51:00.002Z

Regular readers of Britains favourite TV review blog will know that Mickey and Davie always try and please their loyal fans. Our motto was always deliver the goods and keep going until they are satisfied. So to tip our hat towards our cousins in Wales and following on from a request from M&DTVR fave "wickie" I spent 30 minutes watching Come Dine with me on S4c this afternoon. You will be pleased to know that it is as crap in Welsh as it is in English. I have grown weary of Come Dine with me. I used to think it was entertainment. Then I stopped and had a good hard look at myself. Why am I watching other people cook and have dinner ?? I do that myself every night. I know how to cook. How to eat. How to converse. So what can I possibly learn from this dross ? As from today, Saturday 12 th June 2008, there will be no more Come Dine with me. It is time to clean my TV cupboards and throw out those programmes that I think maybe one day I will watch. This is ruthless Davie signing off and deciding what to do with 7 hours of "Dirt" on sky plus.

Large male sibling

2008-06-10T17:14:00.008Z

So, first things first. Apprentice final this week.

Last week, Lucinda left. Boo. Bad luck Benton Bag Lady. If Lucinda had won you'd have won the special prize which was going to be a £2.50 book token or something.

Alex Wotherspoon and his sly sneaky, grassy, "Ooh ooh Sir Alan, Sir! Lucinda said she didn't want your job! Fire her, Sir Alan, Sir!" What an utter tool. He'll probably win, the smug, self-admiring, own-cheek-sucking, death-threat-receiving knob.

Then there's Lee McQueen with his unforgivable spelling and unforgivable lies. In my profession, (yes ladies and gentlemen, I am a professional), lies in the CV mean the end of the road. Much as I like Lee and want him to win, I'd have fired him there and then.

Then there's Helene who seems to have kept her place simply because she didn't get the sack from her old job.

And finally Clare who I used to hate, but now just dislike.

So, yes. Lee to win, then Clare, then Helene, then the knob. If the knob wins, I won't run naked round the streets of Newcastle, but I might step into my back garden in my underpants.

And so onto Big Brother. Once Davie's and my favourite reality television programme. Now an annual parade of utter cack.

I think it was during the opening night of Big Brother 7 that I discovered what an utter tool I'd been for watching so many past series. It was when a rat faced ponce with a large ego, named "Sezer" strutted down the stairs into the house, and before going through the inner door, looked directly into the camera and said something about the house going to be "Sezer's Palace". Do you see? Like Caesar's Palace! I think he may also have said "Recognise" but I may be wrong. Even if I live to the time humanity attains immortality I will never see anything more obnoxious on television or in real life. It made those stage show kids from Emu's Pink Windmill Show look like Alan Bennett.

This vicious ratfaced man had come close to ruining television forever. I didn't see the rest of that series. I stopped watching television for six months in protest. "Sezer's Palace recognise"? Sometimes I find myself at home feeling sort of okay but knowing that there's something wrong, something bothering me, but I can't quite put my finger on it. Then after I've thought about it, I remember. Sezer's Palace. Recognise.

My favourites in this series are Kathreya, the hilariously over the top Thai massage therapist who loves her cookies! Dennis, the fabulously over the top Edinburgh dance student teacher who loves his things! And Rebecca, the wonderfully over the top Coventry nursery nurse who loves her Hanson! Great personalities. Great people. Great television!

More please Channel 4! How about for Big Brother 10 a champion of champions. I for one would be fascinated to see Cameron and Craig in a house together! Which one will Kate Lawler fall for!??

Sorry everyone. I'll stop now.

Lost

2008-06-02T18:45:00.002Z

Great pun in the previous title Michael. Well readers I have to tell you how much I have enjoyed Lost. It is a long time since I was on the edge of my seat and last nights finale got me as close as anything I can remember. Now I have to wait another 7 months before the next series - can we not get this made a bit quicker JJ Abrams and your cohorts??

And good old Michael is out of the Apprentice - I would have like to see him squirm under the interview panel's scrutiny but I enjoyed seeing his smug face turn when Sugar booted him out. I thought Helene was going but I think whilst she may be hopeless she actually wants the job and therefore I have a soft spot for her. But clearly Lee is going to win.

I have borrowed Series 3 of the Wire from Mickey. But dear friends that is not comedy. I need some comedy in my TV routine if I am to overcome this feeling of melancholy.

Sommers over

2008-05-20T17:27:00.003Z

Yes, just like Davie says, apologies and all that. I know I've let you down, and I don't want to beg, but please, I'm begging you, please, just give me one more chance. Just one more chance! I promise you I won't let you down again.

And like the soft hearted puppy that is Sir Alan Sugar, you accept my doe eyed monotone shameless entreaties and read on, knowing in your heart of hearts that it's just going to be the same old rubbish about cookery programmes and Battlestar Galactica.

It was on for only eight episodes, it finished its UK run a couple of weeks ago and it starred that Zoe Slater lass off of EastEnders. I am of course referring to the Bionic Woman.

It was a reimagining of a seventies classic, a bit like that programme I like, what's it called again? Yes, Battlestar Galactica.

In many ways it was similar to BSG (as I like to call it). One of the producers was David Eick (whoever he is). Katie Sackhoff was a supporting cast member playing a slightly disturbed tough girl. Erm, the font used in some of the titles looked similar and plots revolved around things happening involving people.

So far, so good. They were ticking all the right boxes.

Unfortunately, they forgot about one thing when making the Bionic Woman. They forgot to make it good. Or to put it another way, they forgot to not make it crap.

You see, where Battlestar Galactica is written so that it is interesting and keeps your attention, Bionic Woman was written so that it was not interesting and doesn't keep your attention. It's an easy mistake to make.

And who's the real fool? The US writer who thought that weak, unimaginative storylines with no surprises would do in this day and age (I believe I should refer to phenomena such as the myspace generation and "Youtube" at this point)? Or me for sitting through eight episodes of poor television knowing that it had been cancelled for being not very good?

The answer of course is Apprentice cock Michael Sophocles for not knowing what kosher means despite being half-Jewish. If he doesn't get fired in the next two weeks I shall walk naked through the streets of Newcastle in protest.

Here we go again

2008-05-19T19:03:00.002Z

Many apologies dear readers blah blah blah. I know it appears that we have lost interest in you. Well for a brief moment we did but after a heart rendering late night chat over the washing up on Saturday night, Mickey and Davie are back. Well, Davie is. Mickey might be back tomorrow.

What is good - the Apprentice remains my favourite current programme. I am glad my pick, the ginger one has gone. Never have I not wanted to win as much. What a terrible human being she appears to be. I am loving Raef and warming to fat Clare. Lee McQueen strikes me as a bit dim but likable and I would like to see him do well. The small squat, Michael, I believe he is called must go next. To classify people who would not pay £600 for a fairy cake from a pushy middle-class first class a-hole like him as "dum-dums" was a step too far for me. And is 1977 0 who uses the phrase "dum-dum" anymore??. Right I have to go for my tea now - more ramblings on Wednesday my friends. Keep the faith.

Bad Mickey

2008-04-24T17:19:00.005Z

I haven't posted in weeks. It's very bad, and like Davie in his last post, I am apologising to you, our many dear readers. Here's a selection of ramblings to make you wish I'd not bothered.

There's a lot of good television at the moment. It's difficult to find fault!

Yes, there are the adverts for mobile phone networks which have got nothing to do with mobile phones, and seem to say that buying a mobile phone will allow you to live in a world of teddy bears, or that buying a mobile phone will make you part of a gang of utter tools who have nothing better to do than pretend to make a rainbow with some coloured material.

And there's the advert for Loyd Grossman food products which in summary says "Buy the Loyd Grossman food product because Loyd Grossman talks with an unusual accent which people imitate." Who cares that it might taste like burnt sick*, listen to the way he says things!! It's unusual!

* I've not tried it but I'm sure it doesn't

At least they're better than that godawful one with the gorilla playing the drums. Eeh, it's so good. Look at the gorilla playing the drums!! Looka! He's playing the drums!! Buy our choccy cos the monkey's on the drums!! What's that all about? And it's not as if he's playing anything cool. He's playing Phil Collins! Phil Collins the man who decided it would be a good idea to do a cover version of the Cyndi Lauper whine-a-thon "True Colo(u)rs" and that all he cared about was that there would have to be lots of children in the video. Not exactly Pete Doherty.

So, the Apprentice. There are some hateful people in it this year. Out of the initial sixteen, only four of them seem to have any sense of humanity about them. The rest are vicious back-stabbing hateful blame throwing buckpassing egotistical delusional cocks.

Of the final eleven, I only have respect for Lucinda, Raef and LeeMcQueen. The other eight are all trying to be a cross between Hopkins (the nasty one from last year - don't get me started on her, seriously) and Ruth "Ruth Badger off of the Apprentice" Badger.

Alex, obviously, is a weasely (sp?) Jason Orange wannabe who spends all the task working out what is going wrong and making sure that someone else can be blamed for it.

My pick (see one of the posts below, the only mistake I've made so far this year), Jennifer, has not a shred of humanity within her cold cold soul. All she knows is how utterly brilliant she is at selling. And she's completely humourless.

Whenever Jenny, Davie's pick, speaks up for someone nasty, or belittles someone nice, she does it with such passionate monotony she dirties my soul. Kittens die when she smiles.

But the worst is Claire. Plain speaking Claire. No nonsense Claire. Ruth Badger wannabe Claire. Me me me Claire. Last night she cried as she won her task through bad planning, complacency, panic and luck. But if you'd tasted those tears, readers, you would have died. Pure poison.

So there you have it, a summary of all that is great about British television. Come back in another four weeks for another bunch of stuff about how I don't watch Britain's Got Talent and my thoughts on the advert from a few months ago where Pierce Brosnan tells gentlemen everywhere that they are indeed worth it.

Bad Davie

2008-04-15T21:51:00.002Z

Many apologies dear readers. It has been too long etc. Since you last enjoyed my sideways glance at life, I have become a huge fan of Mad Men. It is on BBC4 and I rarely watch BBC4. But Mad Men is top notch Sunday night entertainment. The funny thing is that not a lot happens in each episode apart from a lot of smoking, lead character Don straying with a female client and his attractive mrs cooking him some food and looking pretty hot. But it is strangely addictive and I still cannot work out why.

Of course I have also been enjoying the Apprentice. True, I am beginning to regret choosing the ginger one as my pre-series pick to win as it appears that she is the nearest thing to the devil since the posh one from last year. But it is fantastic TV and it would appear that the producers have gone out of their way to find some of the thicket people in the UK. They need to keep Kevin the bank manager (really ? Is he perhaps someone who once opened a bank account as opposed to someone who approves loans of millions of pounds) and Raith for as long as possible. I did think the tough looking one, Lee would win but he appears to have started referring to himself in the third person (and that is never a good sing - it was exactly this that lead to the downfall of Clark Datchler and Johnny hates Jazz) but now I think it may be the soldier, Simon.

One day to go

2008-03-25T20:58:00.003Z

The Apprentice is by far the greatest reality television show on television. It's so excrutiating seeing these cocksure ambitious types completely mess up a presentation to a proper business executive. It makes me feel much better about myself.

It reminds me of when I was training to be an accountant. They'd send you off on a residential management training course where you'd have to do Apprentice type tasks (obviously on a much smaller scale). Inevitably at some point on these courses I'd have to give a presentation to someone pretending to be a proper business executive, and no matter how awful I was, I was like Richard Branson compared to these jokers.

So here are the guesses for this year's Apprentice and it's all ladies. No one has picked a blokey.

Bentonbag = pink arrow

Friend of Mickey and Davie's TV Rant, GP = red arrow

Davie = blue arrow

Mickey = green arrow.

Any more guesses (and to be honest no-one else reads this rubbish so there won't be any more) will have to be received before 9pm tomorrow.

It has to be the ginger one

2008-03-24T19:21:00.002Z

Thanks for the comedy tips Mickey. I had forgotten about Series 1 of Curb your Enthusiasm. It is because Mrs Davie has put it in a different drawer to my other DVD's. Out of sight out of mind I am afraid. I will rectify the situation tonight.

As for the Apprentice, I have to say that I am really looking forward to it. If previous series are anything to go by, the series at the very least gives me more confidence that anyone can succeed at work with just a modicum of intelligence. And without wishing to blow my own trumpet, I have more than a little. But it is cracking entertainment and the challenges are generally well designed and interesting. Having perused the photo I agree that it will be a woman who wins this year. But Mickey, my old comrade, I think you are wrong with your choice. It will of course be the ginger one next to your pick who will be crowned Sir Alan's apprentice this year. And that my friend is a fact.

Sitcoms for Davie

2008-03-22T18:40:00.004Z

Okay then. So sitcom suggestions for Davie:

Peep Show - I missed the first couple of series as I found the situation where the sensitive one was getting bullied by school children a bit too close to my own life to be funny, but having given it a second chance, I realise that this is the funniest British sitcom in years.

The IT Crowd - Even if it hadn't been funny I would have forced myself to laugh at this and pretend to enjoy it, as it's written by one of the blokeys who wrote Father Ted. But it turns out that it's funny enough to not need my charity.

Curb Your Enthusiasm - Davie actually has series one on DVD. I can't believe he's blatantly complaining about having no comedy to watch when the disks are sitting unwatched in his DVD cabinet. Davie - your wife bought you those! Show a little gratitude and watch it!

The Office (American version) - I don't know whether it's really uncool to like this, but I do. Obviously it's not the Ricky Gervais one, but it has its moments. Currently being shown early on a Sunday morning on ITV2. Not really sure about ITV's programming strategy here.

Entourage - Not sure whether this is a sitcom or not. I don't laugh at it that much, but it's very entertaining, and it's done by HBO, so it's probably cool or something. Currently being shown early on a Sunday morning on ITV2. Not really sure about ITV's programming strategy here.

My Family - Oh Robert Lindsay, you've done it again! First Citizen Smith, then that thing about a boxer with the dreadful theme tune, and now My Family. Bravo Mr Lindsay, bravo!

With the Apprentice returning on Wednesday, it's only right to reintroduce the Mickey and Davie's TV Rant Guess Who Will Win The Apprentice Based Purely On The Publicity Photo competition. There are no prizes, so don't phone in, but everyone is welcome to have a go.

So I think this year it's time for a lady to win, and this one looks extremely competent. Oh yes.

The one under the green arrow. She's my tip.

Davie, care to take a guess?

Lazy Channel 4

2008-03-15T19:50:00.003Z

I read Mickey's assassination of Kevin Mcleod with interest. I like Kev - I like the fact that he owns 365 coats and wears them in rotation. I also like the fact that he tries to dramatise what is essentially a fairly calm and staid programme. I like Grand Designs as a programme as I find it interesting what people will put themselves through to build a house. However, much as I like it, I am not a fan of Channel's 4 decision to string out the series like it is currently doing. Grand Designs revisited is a terrible concept. It is cheap and Channel 4 know it. To simply rehash the programme and add a couple of minutes where Kevin walks up the drive and has a quick chat with the owners of the house as to how they have enjoyed living in it is not my idea of cutting edge TV. The fact that it is preceded by Location Location revisited where Phil is now visiting people he and Kirsty helped means that Wednesday night is 2 hours of prime time repeats. Come on Channel 4 you can do better than this.

On the plus side of life I am still looking for suggestions on sit-coms I should be watching and I am delighted that Kirsty Gallagher and Ian Wright have been picked as the new hosts for Gladiators. I am currently trying to persuade Mickey to pump some iron and then he can enter what is bound to be the hit series of the summer.

Kevin McCloud

2008-02-25T18:26:00.006Z

There's only so much Kevin McCloud you can take before he starts irritating you. In the past I've found his dramatic pauses and pompous asides quite endearing. I've enjoyed pretending to be Kevin, although I only own two coats.

But recently he has begun to annoy me. Every building he visits, he goes on about the vision of the architect, and the passion of the owner. He goes on about integrity, the sustainability of the materials, how faithful the property will be to its surroundings. And then.

And then, he pauses, thinks about what he's about to say, and says something like "Martin first undertook this project to give his family the dream home they always wanted. I'm worried that this so-called dream home, is turning into (slight pause) a nightmare." And then it goes onto a commercial break.

With his hard hat and his numerous coats, I'm beginning to think he's a one trick pony. We need to see more variety from you, Kevin, and there's only one way to do that. Strictly Come Dancing 2008. Get yourself partnering that Flavia lass.

Kev v Gordon

2008-02-21T22:50:00.002Z

Wednesday night viewing is pretty good at the moment. Channel 4 is leading the way with Grand Designs followed by Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares USA. You could not get two more different hosts. We spoke last week about "Ramma" as I like to call him and his top-class swearing. Sometimes unnecessary. Always amusing. But before that we have good old Kevin Mcleod and Grand Designs. Kev must be one of the nicest men on TV. Where Gordon likes nothing better than a good f-word (brilliant I know), Kevin will not use one sentence said in a matter-of-fact manner when a verbose monologue with at least one dramatic pause can be used instead. And how many coats does he own ? Las night I counted 5. That is not a record by the way. I think my favourite one at the moment is his green Berghaus.

I decided last night I am watching too much drama and I need to watch more comedy. Mickey has suggested the IT crowd and maybe My Family. I am not so sure dear readers. So what should I watch ??

More great swearing

2008-02-14T23:17:00.004Z

I agree with Davie that Gordon Ramsay's swearing is a marvellous thing. Much as I love it when he swears at the idiots he's trying to help, I like it best when he's on his own at the end, having sorted it all out, there are no problems left to solve, he's walking off into the sunset, and, for no reason at all, he just swears under his breath. There's really no need, but it's always a great bit of television.

But I don't think Ramsay is the best swearer on television. No, ladies and gentlemen I do not.

The best swearer on television is Susie Essman. She plays Larry David's manager's wife in Curb Your Enthusiasm and she really is the master of the potty mouth. She swears with such ferocity, her face twisted in vitriolic fury, jabbing fingers and fiery eyeballs, she doesn't even need to say the word for it to be offensive. But she does.

I love Curb Your Enthusiasm. But it's only this series that I've realised how much I love Larry David's manager's wife. She's the most hateful, unpleasant, aggressive character on television, and I think she might be the greatest comedy creation this century.

Great swearing

2008-02-13T22:49:00.002Z

I am absolutely loving Ramsays Kitchen Nightmare USA on Channel 4. I think it is so enjoyable as good old Gordon has not changed his style to suit the Americans. And his style just does not sit easily with them. Week after week he encounters those wholly insincere Americans that we have all encountered at some point in our lives and week after week he launches into expletive laden diatribes that if he was dealing with Brits we would probably not flinch at but which for some reason are compulsive watching when aimed at the Yanks. It as if they have never heard to f word directed at them directly. The look of sheer delight on some of the waitresses faces as this weeks victim (the owner/chef) was described as a fat, lazy effing pig was a joy to behold. I really like Ramsay - he swears and speaks his mind. I have no doubt some of it is for show but I reckon he is the kind of guy you would go on the pull with and he would tell you honestly if someone was out of your league.

Apologies for the lack of February activity. Mickey and I are just too excited about meeting the rest of the Journal blog team.

Torchwood

2008-02-01T19:05:00.000Z

I do wish they'd stop all this adult content on Torchwood.

It's all so unnecessary. Here I am, sitting at home, settling down for a nice bit of sci-fi escapism. Maybe I've got a glass of fruit juice or I'm having a small fun size chocolate bar as a treat. I don't want any trouble, just want to enjoy a story in which time travel, creatures from space or spooky things play a significant role.

What I don't want is to see a bunch of incompetents blunder from bed to bed, putting the fate of all existence on whether they fancy someone or not, falling in lust with people in a completely unconvincing way and acting completely unprofessionally in a work environment.

You have the Welsh girl going from Guppy to Barrowman even though she's engaged. You've got the boss, Barrowman, going after the office junior during work time which would generally be frowned upon in a professional organisation. How can Barrowman do his year end appraisals with any objectivity? He'd have serious problems in an industrial tribunal if he sacked someone.

All for the sake of Torchwood being an "adult" programme.

Well, I say no. It's not adult. It's very very childish. It seems to be written with exactly the same mentality as Doctor Who, except they've stuck a few bedroom scenes in, and put in a bit of saucy chat about kissing and cuddling and that.

I'm sorry to harp on about it all the time, but if you want adult mixed with fantasy, watch Battlestar Galactica. The writers haven't just redone Star Trek and added a couple of sex scenes and a few swears. They've written an adult drama which just happens to be in space. And that's how Torchwood should be done. An adult drama which just happens to have Welsh people kissing and a cuddling in it.

Hmm. This is perhaps my worst post ever. I should have just gone on about how India Fisher's narration on Masterchef is still annoying me. ("For now they can relax, but tomorrow they face two even tougher challenges etc." every episode. Every single episode.)

Mastermind

2008-01-21T19:44:00.000Z

I remember as a child that Ma Davie was a huge fan of University Challenge and Mastermind. She loved answering the questions and to be fair she generally did pretty well. I used to listen to her and think she was very intelligent and would I ever reach that level of intelligence. Of course I knew I would and even at the tender age of 11 I was aware that Ma Davie had many years more experience than me and had read more books and therefore it was only a matter of time before I became that intelligent. I am watching Mastermind as I type. Has this been dumbed down ? I could never answer any questions and now it all seems fairly straight forward and I could certainly make a guess at a lot of the questions rather than pass. And there has been a woman on who chose "The Sopranos" as her specialist subject !! Really - is this allowable? In the 1980's they picked subjects such as "the life and works of some obscure musician" or "King Henry VIII's life between 1508 and 1511". Now someone is picking their favourite TV programme ? I could go and answer questions about the Bill or Neighbours and presumably win this competition. Unbelievable.

Mickey's Review of Christmas Part 2

2008-01-08T17:25:00.000Z

Davie's criticism of Doctor Who's Christmas Special allows me to flow seamlessly into part II of my eagerly awaited "Mickey's Review of Christmas" series of posts. For my next thing that I was going to review was the Doctor Who Christmas Special.

And here, I'm starting it now. Look!

Doctor Who

Six weeks ago I was going to do a blog entry where I predicted that the Doctor Who Christmas special would be rubbish. But I was busy with other things (work and that probably, but it might have been laziness), so what would have been an incisive piece of speculative tripe never got to be written. What it would have said was that the fact that they've got Kylie Minogue in it meant that the story would be very dull and they needed a star name to make us forget about how bad it was.

And it turns out that if I had written this, I would have been right. Not even the presence of the great B Cribbins (when oh when will he be knighted?) could rescue it.

And now Davie has watched it, thinking that the Christmas Special will be one of the better episodes, finds a lot of rubbish about a mad company director, and it puts him off sci-fi for another ten years. My success in recommending Heroes to him had almost persuaded him to watch Battlestar Galactica, but this has cancelled out all my good work.

There was one good thing about it. One of the few people to survive was the arrogant dislikable fellow and at the end of it he was still arrogant and dislikable. He hadn't "grown" or "learnt something". I liked that. It reminded me of real life.

New Year Celebrations with Take That

Not my choice of programme to watch over the new year, although thank all that is good that we didn't watch Jool's Holland Hootenanny which appears to have been recorded and not done live over New Year. (Seriously, anyone who thought it was live is clearly a little dim, and anyone who then wrote in to complain that it wasn't live can't handle the 21st century and needs to be taken away to somewhere safe.)

Back to Take That - if there's anyone I didn't want to be the first to "officially" wish me happy new year it was Kate Thornton. I'd have had a happier new year if she'd kept her official new year wishes to herself, but there you go - 2008 off to the worst possible start, thanks Kate.

So there you have it. I watched four programmes over Christmas and New Year and they were all dreadful old rubbish. If only I'd taken time to watch To The Manor Born.

2008-01-07T21:43:00.000Z

Happy 2008 readers. Well wasn't Christmas TV rubbish ? I try not to watch too much over the festive period but on Christmas night I settled down with Mrs Davie and watched Doctor Who and To the manor born. Now regular readers will appreciate I am no fan of the sci-fi. But Kylie was in Doctor Who so I thought I would give it a go. Lord it was tedious. Yes Kylie was in it and yes she is an attractive girl but is that really the best they can do - a complete rip off of the Poseidon Adventure ? I used to really quite like To the Manor Born but when it was at its peak in the mid 80's did it really have no discernible plot line in an episode? There was about two minutes of nostalgia and 58 minutes of boredom/disbelief.

Still it is 2008 and time to look forward. Already I am enjoying Brotherhood on FX and Damages on BBC1. I had heard nothing about Damages but it might be the best thing on the box right now. Watch it - go on - make it your new years resolution.

Mickey's Review of Christmas Part 1

2008-01-03T16:53:00.000Z

Here's my special New Year treat for you all:

A summary of some of the things that I saw and whether I thought they were good or not.

1. Christmas at the Riviera

I've just checked on imdb.com and it appears to have been written and produced by the same people who did The Worst Week Of My Life, which I've never seen, but got good reviews.

It had an allstar cast, with the likes of Alexander Armstrong (out of Armstrong and Miller), Sam Kelly (off of Allo Allo), the bloke who was the neighbour in Saxondale (out of Saxondale), Ferris (off of Darling Buds of May), Reece Shearsmith (out of the League of Gentlemen) etc.

With credentials like that, surely this should be a surefire laugh a minute hit. But wait, it's Christmas. So lets go for tragic characters going through genuinely traumatic and upsetting situations. Poor old Sam Kelly getting over euthanising (is that a word?) his wife from terminal cancer, Ferris going through chemotherapy for her own cancer. Great uplifting and life affirming comedy for Christmas Eve.

It reminded me of the classic Only Fools and Horses Christmas Special when Rodney collapsed in Del's arms as he told him that his beloved Cassandra had had a miscarriage.

2. My Family

I don't watch My Family generally although I understand that Mrs Davie is a big fan.

While I had no fault with the comic performances on show (Lindsay and Wanamaker are at the top of their game), nor with the plot of the programme (genuine farce with very little mawkish sentiment, and no life shattering tragedies to deal with) I watched with a strange sense of bemusement.

My sister-in-law and her family were laughing away, making appreciative comments and looking extremely satisfied with the entertainment on offer. Meanwhile, my brother and I simply sat, occasionally exchanging bewildered glances as to why we weren't enjoying what clearly should have been riproaring British comedy at its best.

I could see that there were jokes and comic situations. I could see where I was supposed to laugh at, and I saw that it was quite well done. But it left me numb. That's right. Lindsay and Wanamaker left me cold and numb.

In summary then: Christmas at the Riviera: not good, less human tragedy in future please; My Family: not good, make it a different kind of funny so that my brother and I will laugh in future please.

I could go on, but I'm trying to cut down on my blog length. I'll do part two in a few days. And as it's 2008 I'll not do my "what I watched on television" bit either. Mind you, I should end with some sort of unfunny quip or in-joke (possibly referencing something that I've written earlier in the post) that finishes the thing off.

Erm, I used a semi-colon in an earlier paragraph. I don't know, but it was probably not appropriate. I've never been able to use them properly. I got a C in English Language O-Level you see.

This writers strike

2007-12-20T17:44:00.000Z

Michael. I am very pleased to hear you have bought the first Spooks series. I may need to borrow that from you. After all I hear these writers who are striking in the US are sticking to their guns. I am very worried about how little good TV will appear in January, which is of course the second most depressing month in the year after April. Already there will be no 24 until it is finished and only half of Lost. Probably will be no Desperate Housewives either. BBC3 seems to have decided that screening any other series of The Apprentice USA is simply too much effort. The Schofield brothers are probably going to be stuck in animated suspension in Panama until 2011. This strike is going to be a real pain as there are very few good British programmes that come out in the early part of the year. So with that in mind I am trying to get into the Unit on Virgin. President Palmer from 24 is in it and appears to believe he is playing the same character. It is quite good but I thought it would be more dramatic and have other twists. At the moment i appears to be an updated version of the A-Team except they have wives in the Unit. Still I will probably be glad of it in January.

Yes, Spooks

2007-12-19T19:17:00.000Z

Davie (or Davy) is totally correct with his opinion of last night's Spooks.

I can honestly say that this series of Spooks has been the best British made drama series I have ever seen. Yes. I liked it better than Doctor Who. That's how good it was.

(I'll explain myself here. The last series of Doctor Who was magnificent in places, containing some brilliant episodes, but it also had some really crap ones - notably the ones with the Daleks in New York. This series of Spooks was consistently brilliant. There were no bad episodes. Every one was an absolute classic.)

I haven't watched earlier series, so I bought the first series on DVD tonight. I found it in Tesco for £15. I've heard it's not as good as this series, but I feel it's the least I can do considering how much enjoyment this series gave me.

The other thing I watched last night was the special feature length Battlestar Galactica episode, Razor.

I was a bit dubious when I heard about this - an all new episode, but set a few years ago - what's the point? I know none of the major cast members will die. I know that whatever happens, it won't affect anything.

And after I'd watched Spooks I was even more dubious. Nothing would reach the dramatic heights of the final scenes. I was going to be disappointed.

How wrong I was. I absolutely love Battlestar Galactica, and this episode was one of the best. Just because it's set in space it's easy to dismiss it as sci-fi rubbish, but it's so much more than that. It bears as much resemblance to Star Trek and the like as The Shield does to Jake and the Fatman.

And it had some really good scenes with old style cylons (you know like off of the old series with Face off of the A Team).

If this US writers' strike means that the final series doesn't get finished I shall never watch television again.

What I watched on television last night

Spooks - it was okay. Kept me entertained, I suppose.
Battlestar Galactica Razor. The usual scifi rubbish I normally talk about.

What I've just done there is the same joke I did here. Well done me.

Spooks

2007-12-18T22:58:00.000Z

Spooks - absolutely brilliant. I had some doubts that the move away from the self contained episode would work but I need not have feared. The series finished tonight and it was a great ending. Poor old Adam has no luck. I hope they are going to do another series like this.

Did not watch Dragons Den last night - never fear readers, I do have it on Sky Plus but last night I was listening to Sir Ranulph Fiennes talking. He was telling us about his trips to the Antarctic. A very good speaker but a little bit mental - why would you put yourself through that kind of pain.

Apologies for the shorter blog tonight - need to take our new four legged friend out for a walk now.

December and he is still investing

2007-12-10T22:20:00.000Z

Apologies to regular readers who will have noted a lack of activity on this blog in recent times. Mickey and I have been very busy and have even appeared in print. We have now got over the shock and are going to make a concerted effort to bring you, the readers, some hard hitting views on TV.

Now given my last sentence I must apologise for harping back to Dragons Den. It is Monday and I have just watched the latest episode. I was very excited when the BBC2 announcer started suggesting that Duncan may consider investing this week. And to be fair to big Dunc as I like to call him, he did invest £75k this week along with his good pal James "look at my chest hair" Caan. There was a catch though. That inventor who he invested in had offered to give Duncan a written guarantee that he would have his money back in 3 years. So really apart from missing out on a little bit of interest he is not actually risking anything. They may as well have a bank manager from Barclays on asking for money to deposit in a high interest current account. James seemed very excited to be able to throw more money at yet another investor. In the background you could see Peter and Theo sniggering at the hapless duo.

Before investing Duncan did give us a moment of pure drama though. An inventor had demonstrated his magnetic light bulb. The Dragon's seemed mildly interested. Duncan however quite rightly pointed out that if a Force 8 Hurricane blew through his house in Darlington, the light bulbs may fall to ground and smash and his children would have their feet shredded as they ran over the shards of glass. A very valid point Duncan - keep this up and you will soon get the Watchdog gig.

Worst. Show. Ever.

2007-12-10T20:23:00.000Z

Once again I have gone weeks without a post (apologies to our hundreds of readers), but today I saw a programme that demanded my scrutiny and needle sharp criticism.

Today a programme arrived on my screen that makes one of Britain's best known entrepreneurs, Peter Jones' ill-fated vanity project Tycoon look like The Sopranos.

Britain Sings Christmas is an epic show in which a choir of top celebrities, including Diarmuid Gavin (sp?), ABC's Martin Fry and Janine from EastEnders sing the top ten Christmas songs according to a poll, and the British public get the privilege to vote as to which one of the tunes is the best. And Kate Thornton presents it! She's still working!

It is everything I hate - a Christmas special celebrating Christmas songs. Celebrities being cheerful about these godawful mawkish travesties of music. The title. Britain Sings Christmas. What does that mean? Can a country sing Christmas? The website even has a clip of James Blunt (James Blunt!) talking about why he thinks some Christmas carol should be the best one (I'd have looked at the clip to find out which one, but my PC is so bad now I can't play videos). One of the songs is that Carey squawkfest All I Want For Christmas Is You. And did I mention that it's presented by Kate Thornton?

Yes, yes, I know it's for charity, but really. Just because it's for charity doesn't necessarily mean it's good. How about Britain Vomits, where a selection of top celebrities such as Katie Hopkins from the Apprentice, Midge Ure from Ultravox and Anton du Bek (sp?) off of Structly Come Dancing eat a selection of raw diseased meats and month old dairy products (as chosen by the British public). The first to fill a ten litre container with their sick wins £10,000 for the charity of their choice. Would that be okay?

What I've been watching recently:

I'm still persevering with Charlie Jade, on FX. I'm only eight episodes in though and it's getting increasingly difficult to watch. Things happen in it and the plot is progressing, but it's just really really dull. I wish I didn't have this strange compulsion to finish watching a series once I've started.
The Riches. This has really grown on me. At first it was all a bit "yeah okay, it passes the time" sort of thing, but I'm really enjoying it. I have nothing further to say, other than Minnie Driver was in the worst film ever made, Hope Springs.
Spooks. I've come into Spooks very late. I'm going to have to buy the DVDs of earlier series, as I absolutely love it. It's so good that it cancels out the badness of Robin Hood, and still leaves enough positive to counteract Bobby Davro in EastEnders.

I must confess that I only watched the first two minutes of Britain Sings Christmas. I tried watching more but as soon as I saw Simon Bates was in the choir I had to turn off. Bates is dead to me and I won't have him on my television. There. I've said it.

November and finally he has invested

2007-11-20T20:02:00.000Z

It is indeed November Michael and last night finally saw the great entrepreneur Duncan Bannatyne finally invest on Dragons Den. Regular viewers of the BBC programme will be aware that Duncan last invested in an idea presented on the programme back in the early 1980's and has since seemed to make it his personal mission to be the first Dragon to say he has no interest in the idea or the person in front of him. In some ways I guess he had to go down this route as Peter Jones has already grabbed the mantle of "dragon with the great one line put downs". So it was really dramatic TV to see that he finally invested in someone last night. Now don't worry he has not gone completely mad and and he made sure he went 50:50 with new boy James Caan. James was desperate to invest in something and I think Duncan felt a bit sorry for him. The only problem was they have invested in one of the worst ideas ever to appear on the show(a website to order you takeaway from - you know rather than pick up the phone and actually talk) which was presented by an Aussie who is clearly going to do a runner with the cash leaving his very sweaty and very nervous partner to deal with the two irate dragons. I think Duncan will have the last laugh however. The money he has in front of him on his little table has been there for so long it may no longer be legal tender.

IT'S NOVEMBER!!!

2007-11-12T18:26:00.001Z

I really really need to do this more often. It's not as though television isn't annoying at the moment. Christmas is coming and all the Christmas themed adverts have started. These have always annoyed me and they always will.

It's not just the fact that these godawful Christmas songs that you can't avoid in shops, in pubs, in parties and that, are also being played in my house over pictures of new settees and electrical equipment. It's the fact that the bandwagon-jumping idiots will be getting more royalties for it. If I buy a product from the advertiser, I'm rewarding the artist for writing a Christmas song. When I buy a sofa, I'm effectively going up to Mariah Carey, shaking her by the hand, giving her some money and saying "Have some money for writing All I Want For Xmas Is You".

You see, I'm no fan of Carey. I like rock music, and her soul/hip-hop/rnb type thing she does is everything I despise about music. Yet I do know that of her many works "All I Want For Christmas Is You" (maybe it's called "All I Want for Christmas (Is You)" or something like that) is one of the worst. And yet it keeps getting played and she keeps getting paid because it's a Christmas song.

And that hateful hateful Roy Wood. Even when supposedly Argos make a joke about it, it's still hateful. This ninety year old man getting hauled out every November to mime to a song that would have been forgotten thirty years ago had it not had Christmas in the title and those damned choir singing in the middle of it. Hateful.

At least that McCartney song hasn't been used in an advert that I've seen. I think the bit where the angelic children's choir start singing in "Simply Having a Wonderful Christmas Time" might be the worst moment in pop music. (What possessed him to write those lyrics and what possessed people to buy it? In what sense is multi-billionaire McCartney describing in intricate detail how he is thoroughly enjoying a traditional Christmas something you want to hear about every November?)

And don't try to say "Eeh, though, that Fairytale of New York is a good song" because it's not. It's as bad as all the rest. I'd do a top ten of my most hated Christmas songs, but it's a television review blog and I've sort of overstepped the remit already.

What I watched on the television last night:

Top Gear. I hate Clarkson and all he stands for. I still like Top Gear though. I like to see the cars and that.
Charlie Jade. This is a strange sci-fi type thing on FX. Parallel worlds and that. I think it's a co-production between Canada and South Africa. I sort of like it, as it has that strange unpredictable quality that you get with non-US science fiction (cf Farscape and Lexx), but I think the actual story itself might be really dull. I'm not sure yet. I'm giving it time.

So far I have managed to go through ten and a half months of the year without hearing Noddy Holder shouting "It's Xmas". Please, for the love of God, advertisers and television producers, make this the first year in the last thirty where I can go the whole twelve months.

Come dancing ? Dead to me

2007-10-30T19:57:00.000Z

For some strange reason I have found myself drawn to the current series of Come Dancing on BBC1. This is particularly strange when you consider that I don't dance. Never have. Never will. But it seems quite good entertainment. You get to laugh at Bruce Forsyth - not because he is funny but just seeing how he manages to make a hash of every link. Tess his assistant is easy on the eye. There are some very attractive contestants - for both me and Mrs Davie to ogle. And finally there are the judges who you can imagine have been created especially for the show. The old doddery fool who has an eye for the talent, the two camp ones who bicker constantly and the female with the acerbic wit and botox lips. All good so far. Where the show falls down is with its elimination procedure. The judges give a score to each celebrity after they have danced. But then it is left to the great British public to vote by phone or text for who they liked the best. The two celebs with the lowest votes have to dance off and then the judges choose who stays. Where this plan fails is that the viewing public who watch this programme are clearly thick. For 4 weeks in a row they have voted to keep plucky Kate Garraway. Plucky ? Yes plucky because she hurt her ankle at the beginning of week 1 but has bravely continued. Well bravely continued or realised that this could be a nice little earner and give her numerous magazine front covers. I have nothing against this woman but she has limped around the dance floor like an injured elephant and been possibly the worst dancer I have ever seen (and I have seen Curiosity Killed the Cat live in concert). Yet each week they wheel out some ITV colleague to stress how brave she is and how if she gets another week she might be able to pull together a series of coherent movements that may just may vaguely resemble a dance movement. So vote for Kate. And people do. And a as a result the ones who are competent are put up for elimination. And as a result the celeb who was one of the best 3 has now been evicted. And as a result of that Gabby Logan and her lovely legs are out. Here endeth the sermon and also my interest in this sham of a programme. I knew there was a reason I was not interested in dancing.

Shame on you, Peep Show makers

2007-10-22T17:13:00.000Z

Here I am. Apologies to my many fans for keeping silent for so long, but here finally is my verdict on the recent E4 comedy sketch show, Dogface. This was billed as a "comedy show that combines fast-paced sketches with stylish 'dog-based' animation from the makers of Peep Show."

It was actually a lazy show repeating the same unfunny situations over and over again within each and every episode, interspersed with dog-based animation where pub conversations were played over pictures of dogs playing pool and that.

I've complained about Little Britain before, but at least they show a particular sketch only once per episode. I watched one and a half episodes of Dogface. In the one and a half episodes I watched there were six "sketches" which involved a man (Super Hans out of Peep Show) talking to his friend about man-love. There were six "sketches" which involved a man (Super Hans out of Peep Show) and his wife (or partner) on holiday with the man's parents where the wife (or partner) says something fairly harmless to his mother, he tells his wife to shut up (rudely), the wife then repeats to the man what she just said to his mother, he tells his wife to shut up (rudely), embarrassed silence followed by the man saying something to his mother similar to the thing his wife had said. There were six sketches involving an unhappy weather lady (played by the woman who was in the episode of Peep Show where Mark pretends to be a University student, and who is now in the Peter Serafinowicz show) where the weather forecast degenerates into a rant about a broken relationship.

So what I'm saying is that they're showing these sketches four times per episode. So within a series of six episodes they would have shown these three sketches twenty-four times each. How can they live with themselves? A sketch that in Fry and Laurie's day would have lasted one minute is now stretched to get half an hour (after adverts).

And the sketches weren't funny anyway. Repeating them doesn't help. The sketches that my friends and I wrote when we were drunk fifteen years ago are more deserving of a comedy series than the rubbish on Dogface (although I think most of the sketches would probably have been a little offensive to certain religious groups).

Anyway, Peter Serafinowicz's show is much better. While there are repeated themes in the sketches, they are sufficiently different to meet with my approval. It's not the funniest sketch show ever made, but Serafinowicz is an excellent performer, and he does the best Alan Alda impression I've ever seen. I applaud him. If I had a special Mickey's Prize, this week's would go to Peter Serafinowicz.

Should I now go into what I watched last night?

The Sopranos - Yes, it's good and it was the penultimate episode so lots of interesting things happened. I like the Sopranos.
Some other stuff - I think I'll stop this what I watched last night thing. It's not really doing anything, and if all I watched was the news and a film, it doesn't really make for interesting reading.

I note that Armstrong and Miller return to our screens on Friday in a BBC One sketch show. They were prone to repeating themes in their sketches during their Channel Four days, but they didn't rely on catch phrases and repetition, and it was before Little Britain spoilt it for everyone else. I await their show with cautious optimism.

The Dragons are back

2007-10-15T22:10:00.000Z

Hurrah - Dragon's Den is back on BBC2. Boo - they have dropped Richard the nice Aussie bloke presumably as he was likable and polite to investors and had an investing strategy whereby he actually was putting money into businesses. I mean how was poor Duncan supposed to compete with that.

There are new title scenes in a fetching red and the Dragons have all got nice new hair cuts and Duncan has been told to wear a tie. Presumably because new Dragon James has a hairy chest and is sure as hell going to show it off. Given that poor old Theo Paphitis dare not spend any more of his children's inheritance on such extravagant items as ties, someone had to wear one. And they have let Peter Jones continue. Presumably he begged them for a second chance after Tycoon flopped in the summer. Anyway a couple of them made investments but perhaps the most remarkable thing was what happened to Peter's hair during the hour. It started long and floppy but by 9.30pm it was short and appeared to have been tinted a lovely shade of blond. But by 9.55 the fringe was back. Watch the next episode and you will no doubt see him grow a beard in the first 30 minutes only to return to his baby faced shiny look by the end of the hour.

Don't sing on TV

2007-10-07T17:51:00.000Z

I am enjoying the Restaurant. It is almost as good as the Apprentice. I would love to know how the BBC keep finding an endless supply of complete incompetents to star in these shows. The programme itself is a good idea and I have to say that the twins, (I think they are called are Laura and Jess) are surely going to win it and deservedly show. They are bright, attractive and differ from the rest of the contestants in that they appear to use common sense when making a decision. They are in the final 3 against the Scottish bloke who is actually a decent cook and seems a decent guy and his mrs (more of whom later), and also Jeremy and his mrs (who keeps crying at the merest hint of a problem. Knives are dirty - turn on the waterworks. Dropped a bread bun on the floor - breakdown in a flood of tears whilst the hapless Jeremy looks seemingly paralysed. They really should go next but I think this week's episode may have sealed the fate of the Scottish guy and his wife. The task they were set was to delight there customers. They decided that the natural way to do this would be to sing to their customers as they waited for their apple crumbles to be heated up in the microwave. An unusual decision to make especially given that the wife was clearly tone deaf. She absolutely murdered flower of Scotland and looked like she was pushing a number of diners close to the edge of suicide. But they survived if only because the Ghanian couple they were up against decided to delight their customers by giving them a strawberry after they had finished their meal. Where did they get such an off the wall idea from ?

Ian Beale

2007-09-24T22:04:00.000Z

Ian Beale is not my favourite character in Eastenders. He has not qualities that are admirable or likeable. However he is essential to the programme as he has history and links the past to the present. I am usually not that bothered about his storylines. Ian buys cafe, Ian makes a lot of money, Ian upsets Phil, Ian makes a fool of himself with attractive woman but eventually marries, has child with and divorces said attractive woman. Never really been that bothered by any of them. BUT dear readers, the current storyline where Ian is seemingly being sent gifts/threats from Cindy his first wife has had me excited. It has been well done and because I no longer read Inside Soap I had no idea if Michelle Collins was going to come back and play Cindy. This has made it one of the most enjoyable storylines of recent times. I like being in the dark about storylines as it makes the outcome a little less predictable - well ok 9 times out of 10 you can guess but every once in a while you will be surprised and that has to be a good thing. Now I still do not know if they are intending on bringing her back - and if they do it will have to be a very good storyline. It will also mean that they have used this trick twice with Dirty Den and Cindy - so why not go the whole hog and bring Martin Kemp back - surely he must be sick of his SCS adverts by now ?

Nigella

2007-09-10T21:32:00.000Z

Typical Mickey. He was wanted this blog for years, nay decades and now he has it he is inventing reasons for not blogging. Don't worry readers I am going to have serious words with him.

As I mentioned in my previous blog, there are now 423 cookery programmes on TV every week. I am pretty up to date with Gordon, Jamie and even James Martin on Saturday morning. I think my favourite may be the Aussie chef who appears on a Saturday morning on BBC1 and literally cannot take the smile off his face. His cooking looks ok, a lot of barbecue stuff but given he is an Aussie and lives in Australia that is probably not that unusual. But he grins constantly. It is almost as if he is thinking to himself "you pommie idiots are paying me to tell you how to cook sausages on a fire".

Anyway, yet again I digress. I watched Nigella Express tonight. The basic premise seems to be that Nigella cooks very nice looking food in very short periods of time. It all looks too easy. I like cooking and I quite like my friends. So once in a while I combine the two and cook for my friends. But it takes me ages. I have to think what to cook, but the ingredients and then cook it and that takes time. How come Nigella is able to do all of the above in less than an hour? Does she have assistants preparing the ingredients for her ? Do the BBC employ runners to nip down to the local Tesco and bring back the ingredients whilst she browses her Jamie Oliver cook book ? I have recorded today's episode so I might watch it again and see if I can see shadows of young children working away in the background, chopping onions and grating lemon zest whilst being whipped and cajoled by an over zealous producer. Don't worry readers - we will get to the bottom of this.

The Restaurant

2007-09-09T15:33:00.000Z

Apologies to our many readers for lack of updates from me. My anti-virus software is preventing me from accessing any websites that require a password so I've been unable to blog. Perhaps it has an inbuilt quality filter which realises the rubbish I write shouldn't be published.

This week I have been watching the Restaurant. It's like the Apprentice only with a Restaurant at the end of it, not a job. It's also like the Apprentice in the way that half the contestants are utter numbskulls who shouldn't be allowed near a toaster. My favourite couple so far has been actress Jacqui and jazz drummer Sam.

Neither have any cooking talent. Jacqui spends all her time at front of house apologising to customers for the dreadful food served up like a nightmarish ex-Mickey Mouse Club member, and when Sam's not in the kitchen ruining everything by just being there, he's sitting at his drumkit looking all sad. The highlight of last week's shows was when Sam (who is so gutless he makes me look like Vin Diesel) told the assistant chef that he was sacked - despite him being the only one in the whole restaurant who had any talent. For embarrassment, it wasn't quite at the level of Mani's presentation from Apprentice series two, but it was close.

Compare the Restaurant with the usual reality dross from ITV, Hell's Kitchen. It might actually be quite good, but every two minutes it's interrupted by Angus Deayton's painfully unfunny comments (he's credited as writer - I think he's just going through the motions) so I stopped watching it after half an hour. And blimey, that Kelly Le Brock's not ageing well!

What else I've been watching this week:

Kitchen Criminils - by the end of it, the recap at the beginning of each episode explaining each contestant's "journey" went on for so long there was no time for any competition. Vincent's prattling didn't stop. Thankfully, it's finished. I should have stopped watching weeks ago, but I hate to stop watching something once I've started.
The Sopranos - now that the Shield has finished (now officially my second favourite programme ever (after Battlestar Galactica, of course)) the Sopranos is back to take its place. I'm often compared with Tony Soprano, so the programme is a bit like my life, except Tony's married and I'm not. Will I ever find future Mrs Mickey??

I'll see if I can sort my PC connection next week, might be something to do with cookies or something, but if it fails then I'll be silent until I get a new PC. Davie, hold the fort while I sort things out.

Get with the times Mickey

2007-09-04T18:13:00.000Z

Mickey. The cookery programme has been done to death. If you flick through the Guardian guide you will notice there are exactly 45 cookery programmes on terrestrial TV this week and that is not including Hells Kitchen. You have Jamie, Nigella, James Martin, the fat bloke with the double barrelled name and even Andi Peters has his own show in which he experiments different duck recipes using his old sparring partner Ed's battered corpse.

Police programmes is what all the kids are watching these days. There are exactly 47 of them on this week. But I have distilled it down and you should only watch the Bill. That is the best one now the Shield has finished. I am catching up on last weeks episodes which I recorded when I was on holiday. It is just great entertainment and I like the way producers keep matching up odd couples to patrol the mean streets of Sun Hill. In CID, Phil Hunter and Stuart have some great banter going between them and appear to be trying to out gurn each other in every scene. It is a crying shame that Phil is leaving the Bill to join Eastenders, though I have no doubt he will be the best character in that since Martin Kemp. Anyway, back to the Bill - in uniform they have started pairing up new recruit Beth, who is the smallest policewoman in history (I thought there was a height minimum) and long standing old timers like Tony Stamp and Reg Hollis. There are some lovely one liners in each scene.

I a now fully up to speed with the Shield. For once I agree with Mickey. It is brilliant and I advise anyone who reads this tripe to take him up on his offer and borrow Series 1. You will be hooked. Series 6 has just finished and we now have to wait another 10 months before the final series. That is one long wait and I just thank the gods that I have Sun Hill to keep me company in the meantime.

Come on Tim

2007-08-30T17:58:00.000Z

Yay. I have home internet access again. Finally. It's a little dodgy in that it keeps cutting out, and I'm only getting 1.7Mbps when I should be getting 6.5, but apart from that, I'm very happy.

Over the past couple of months, the stresses and strains of moving have put my futile television rage on the back burner. Why should I get angry about that advert about Mickey, ( you know, the ponce with different hairstyles), when my lawyer is sitting on his behind doing nothing all day unless I phone him every half hour? And what's the problem with that frightening lady singing about how I've got to think! About my currentaccount, today! every quarter of an hour while there is a seller who won't sign a house over, just because she's feeling reluctant even though there's been an agreement to sell FOR THE LAST FOUR MONTHS?

Yes, I can now once again concentrate on the serious issues affecting the world, and I'd like to start by pointing out how annoying Tim Vincent's narration is on BBC2's latest early evening cooking show, Kitchen Criminals (or Kitchen Criminils if you're ex-Tory leader Michael Howard).

It's all fairly standard stuff. Bad cooks chosen by professional chefs. Professional chefs then try to train bad cooks to be good cooks. Every day the worst bad cook goes home. At the end the remaining bad cooks will try to fool critics into thinking they're git good chefs. It's very simple and self-explanatory. And it's ideal for my weeknight dinnertime viewing (cf Masterchef Goes Large, Great British Menu. I'm pathetic, me).

So someone, and I think it'll be the same person who thought that Masterchef Goes Large needs a narrator, thought that this programme needs a narrator. And someone decided that the narrator should speak at all times explaining exactly what we can see with our own eyes, and reminding us what has just happened two minutes ago. The narrator also speculates as to what might happen next given past performances.

So Angela Hartnett, "one of Britain's top female chefs", is teaching her Kitchen Criminils how to fillet a bit of fish. It's fairly obvious that this is what's happening, she's showing them how to fillet a fish, and she's actually said, "I'm going to show you how to fillet this fish." But the narrator (played by Tim Vincent out of Blue Peter) then says "Angela Hartnett shows the Kitchen Criminals how to fillet a fish. They'll need to pay close attention to this as at the end of the day, the Kitchen Criminal who has made the most mistakes will be going home."

"Martha," says Angela, "come over here and help me scrape the scales away here." To which Tim Vincent says, "Angela asks Martha to help her scrape the scales away. Mortgage broker Martha has struggled throughout the week for consistency, will she be able to concentrate enough to be able to keep her place today?"

Tim, I know you're not writing this yourself, but please will you shut up. I don't need to be told what I can see and hear. I do not need to be reminded about what happened ten minutes ago. Your preview of the last half of the show is well meaning but not necessary for a half hour programme. Stop talking about Kitchen Zeroes becoming Kitchen Heroes. I know it rhymes, but it's not very clever when you say it every episode. And finally, work out one way of pronouncing the word "cook" and then stick with it. "Cuck, Coook, Cerk, Ceck." Just choose one.

Viewing of not much interest over the past few days:

I've been watching this mini-series on Sky One. It's probably a repeat. Final Days of Planet Earth. It's rubbish and it really should be for kids, but it's been on at midnight last week. You've got some bloke from Ally McBeal (How I hated that programme, with the way they all went to the bar and sang and danced of an evening with that awful singer Vonda Shepard bawling her way through some dreadful cover of a Barry White song, not that I ever watched an episode), that Daryl Hannah lass and something about a conspiracy involving earthquakes and sinkholes and local government. And the preview summary gave away most of the plot anyway thanks to the idiots who write them having absolutely no sense of drama.
The IT Crowd. Superb. There were many very amusing moments in last week's episode. I could recount them but they wouldn't translate well to the page, especially when I'm involved.

Davie is currently on holiday in Austria so he won't be blogging this week. Fans of sharp snappy reviews of soap operas will therefore have to make do with long drawn out reviews of obscure science fiction and cookery programmes. Many apologies.

Eastenders on holiday

2007-08-23T20:24:00.000Z

Regular readers please do not be concerned. Mickey is still alive but is experiencing some frustrations with the nice people at Sky who have informed him it will be a further 3 weeks before he has internet access. He passes on all his love to you all, especially the ladies.

Eastenders is the best soap on tv right now. That I believe is fact. There are some interesting new characters and storylines about Max and Stacey, little Lucy Beale, Sean attacking Patrick (allegedly your honour) and the arrival of more Mitchells have all been well written and acted. However when I read that this week's programmes were the traditional summer holiday episodes, I had to think seriously if I was going to devote 2 hours of my life to it this week. Previous escapades have been excruciating to watch. Sometimes you cannot believe that the episodes have been shown to the general public. The Slater girls going on holiday a few years ago may have been an all time low and seemed to be telling the story that it is ok to break into someones house and tear up all his clothes if he is a bit posh or has a job which requires him to wear a suit.

This year's episode has actually been ok. I don't know if they deliberately selected the better actors like Pat, Minty, Garry and Shirley to make sure that at the very least the performances would be bordering on professional. Or maybe it was because they did not try to insert comedy into it. Eastenders is miserable. It is meant to be miserable. If I want to laugh I'll watch an episode of Seinfeld. And it was a stroke of genius to introduce Burnside from the Bill. Alright, he is not officially called Burnside but the guy who plays him clearly comes from the school of "one style of acting and that's your lot". In fact it has been so successful they should consider more direct transfers between Sun Hill and Walford.

Brian

2007-08-20T18:53:00.000Z

What about Brian is unlikely to ever make it to terrestrial TV but for those who have E4 I would suggest you watch not one but two episodes of this US series. The first series was quite good. The story seemed to centre around a lovable loser, Brian who spent all his social time with 3 couples who were good looking and successful and eager to set him up with a dream date. That may sound a shocking premise for a show but it was quite good especially as Brian was in love with the fiancee of his best mate. In fact series one ended with him declaring his love for her as his mate arrived home and overheard through the window. All good stuff and enough to make me tune in for the second series.

The second series has been relatively enjoyable but they have killed one of the characters off in an accident, sent one to Minnesota which I believe is the equivalent of sending a character from Neighbours to Adelaide, and completed changed the direction that the remaining five character are going in. Now that may not be a bad thing and life does change I hear you all cry. And I agree. But life does not change direction every week. It is incredible how quickly this programme changes direction. Imagine if in Eastenders, Pat Butcher or whatever she is called these days decided to open a book shop on Monday, then on Tuesday decides to marry Jim Branning, then on Thursday decides she is going to cancel the wedding and is building a hotel which she intends on running with Ian Beale and then on Friday she finds out she has a terminal illness so asks Gus the roadsweeper to kill her. That is how the writers of What about Brian would write a week of Eastenders. Unbelievable.

O'Leary's shame

2007-08-19T16:48:00.000Z

So, Sky Plus. I've had it for less than a week and I've already used up a quarter of the hard disk space. All it takes is a couple of films a week and it'll be full up within a month.

I was going to write about Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (probably about the way everyone is smugly and self-deprecatingly competent), but I haven't watched this week's episode yet.

I did watch episode one of season four of the X Factor earlier today though. After the cliffhanger at the end of the last show where the Borg came along and assimilated Ray, I was expecting a fascinating episode, but it was not to be. All this bother about poor old Bear Grylls staying in hotels when he's doing his survival programmes, and a bit of misunderstanding about the Queen not having a strop (BURN THE DIRECTOR GENERAL! BURN HIM!!), but no-one cares about the utter pantomime paraded as real life drama which is the X Factor.

I'm no fan. I just can't stand the way that every episode there's the usual bunch of no-hopers that are put forward through the unfilmed stages just so they can be humiliated by the judges, followed by the discovery of the tragic yet relatively talented performer. As they leave the audition room weeping at their success, Labi Siffre's Something Inside So Strong comes on (because clearly when Labi Siffre (or whoever wrote the lyrics) wrote the lyrics they were thinking of some little squirt who can warble their way through "I Will Always Love You" like Mariah Carey in a yodelling contest with a goat).

And Cowell's going on about how having some fourteen year old singing a song competently vindicates him for allowing youngsters on to the show as though he's Princess Diana and this is all some sort of social project to provide Britain with a new Michelle McManus.

Then you've got Osbourne and she's all "Oh, I really miss Louis" and (rather cleverly) "I'm really sorry but... ...you're through!" (because, right? If you hear "I'm really sorry", right? You're all thinking, like, "Oh no, I'm not through", right? But then, right? She's all like, "You're through!" right? And like it was all her doing a little trick on you.) Like she didn't try to ruin an Iron Maiden concert just because the lead singer criticised talent contests.

And throughout it all, not one mention of poor old Thornton, sitting at home (perhaps eating a microwave dinner, maybe sitting in her underpants, possibly an unfinished easy sudoku from a free local newspaper sitting on the sofa next to her), her dreams of Saturday night stardom in tatters.

Mind you, it's better than DanceX.

What I watched on television yesterday:

Nothing. I have a life sometimes. It was Saturday, after all. I'm in a new house. I've still got loads of unpacking to do, I need to buy new furniture, do a bit of weeding in my garden, work out where to put my pictures up etc.

In reality, I didn't do any work around the house. I just sat in my underpants and watched the cricket as the dust gathered around me. Much as it pains me, I fear I may be turning into the male Kate Thornton.

Home = yes, television = no

2007-08-09T15:02:00.000Z

Yes, after four long weeks of moving from place to place, ruining the privacy of two of Newcastle's top celebrity couples and nearly destroying twelve-year friendships on the way, I finally moved in to my new home on Tuesday. I know it's not related to television reviews (sorry GP) but I'd like to take this opportunity to thank Mr and Mrs Davie and GP and Haysto for cooking and cleaning for me, and for comforting me at three in the morning when I woke up with night terrors almost every night. I'd also like to thank the solicitors who dealt with my case for really speeding things along. Yes, it only took four weeks. Well done. It's a difficult job getting a few forms signed and arranging a date for completion, and you did it with the minimum of fuss (I only had to call you to chase things up literally four times a day every day for four weeks) and it only caused me four long weeks of stress, uncertainty and misery.

Anyway, much as I love my new house, you'd have thought that in this day and age they come with tv aerials as standard. It's not as though televisions are a new invention. So, I got my tv up and running only to find that I had no signal. It's extremely frustrating. I'm getting an aerial fitted in the loft this weekend (I have a loft - I'm a proper man!), but in the meantime I've got to make do with a portable aerial which can only pick up BBCs One, Two, Three and News 24 on Freeview. It makes my reviewing task a little tricky, especially when there's nothing on these days.

So instead of watching live tv, I've been able to catch up with my viewing of The Wire on DVD. I'm halfway through the first series and, as far as I can tell, nothing much has happened yet. I assume it's building up to something, but to be honest, I wouldn't care if it didn't.

Even though nothing much is happening, it's still really really good (See how my television reviews are witty and inciteful - "really, really good" is like vintage Clive James). There is a story which slowly progresses which is compelling and completely believable. And it's not like your Houses and CSIs which can be dipped in and out even if you've missed an episode (or series). (That, by the way, is a good thing. Ever since Babylon Five,I like a bit of a story arc in my drama.) If you miss an episode, even though nothing much happens, you may as well forget it.

Sorry, I just mentioned Babylon Five. It won't happen again.

What I watched in my new home on my old tv last night:

Heroes - WHY DO THE BBC THINK THAT IT IS A GOOD IDEA TO SHOW THE SURPRISE EXCITING END MOMENT OF AN EPISODE AS A TRAILER TO THAT EPISODE?? The moment in the train where future Hiro comes to give present Peter a message is a magnificent bit of fantasy drama which sets the scene for the rest of the series. It should be a stand out moment full of surprise and shock which leaves you reeling and begging for the next episode. Instead it's shown as an out of context two second clip over and over again on the trails for the programme which completely ruins any suspense when it's shown in the programme itself.
When I watched Hereos on SciFi a few months ago, whenever it came up with the "Next time on Heroes" trailer at the end of the programme, I would mute the television and cover my eyes so I couldn't see what was happening (seriously, I honestly did this). That way, the fathead television people who have no sense of suspense or drama couldn't spoil it for me. As a result, the Hiro from the future scene was a wonderful moment for me, as exciting as the Babylon Five episode where the guy in the spacesuit in Babylon Four is revealed to be future Jeffrey Sinclair. For everyone else, it's as dramatic as an EastEnders episode involving the kidnap of Wellard.

Normal service will be resumed soon. I get Sky Plus on Monday, and home internet connection will soon follow! Count down the days with me readers!

At home with Jamie and not Mickey

2007-08-07T21:24:00.000Z

Right readers. First things first. You will all be pleased to learn that Mickey has finally got the keys to his own home and is no longer residing with me and Mrs Davie. This means that I do not have to sit through endless repeats of My Family and University Challenge and can watch what I want to watch at night again. And with that in mind, coupled with the Ginger Prince's gentle reminder that we are supposed to be reviewing TV programmes in this blog, I settled down to watch Jamie at Home on Channel 4.

I like Oliver. I like what he did with his restaurant and for school dinners. I am sure he has seen some financial benefit having appeared in the programmes and received a lot of free publicity, but at least he did something. I was therefore looking forward to seeing his new programme, especially when I read he would be doing recipes with tomatoes and sausages, which are two of the worlds finest food types. As you would expect, his recipes were good and the food looked top notch. His chilli, tomato and mozzarella salad even made me put my rhubarb yogurt down. But what I did not like was the fact that the cheeky cockney was cooking in his garden shed. I am not one of these people who is obsessed with cleanliness but surely he is contravening some health and safety laws by cooking in the same room as compost and worms ? I'll give him another chance but I hope next week he is back in the kitchen and not showing us how to make chilli con carne in the bathroom.

Hurry Up Hiro!

2007-07-29T15:33:00.000Z

I've spent the last six months telling everyone I know about Heroes. As I was the only person I know watching it on SciFi, it was a lonely experience, a bit like watching Battlestar Galactica. I tried to make up for it by telling everyone how utterly brilliant it was.

So I was very excited last week when it finally started on BBC Two. I sat down to watch with my hosts for the night, Davie and Mrs Davie, and was disturbed at how long it took to get going. There were all these scenes that were supposedly introducing characters but were fairly irrelevant. Hurry up with the scene about the mother shoplifting - it's not important. Show the flying man! Nikki's conversation with her redheaded friend was just timewasting, like a midseason episode of Lost. I wanted to see her get violent with Lindeman's thugs.

So, by the end of the first episode, Mrs Davie was asleep and I now fear for my reputation as being an excellent judge of television series. This was going to be the stepping stone I used to persuade people to watch Battlestar Galactica. Now my plans are in tatters.

I was pleased to read however that Zachary Quinto, who played Adam in day three of 24, and plays Sylar in Heroes is going to play young Spock in the new Star Trek film. I only pray that the other casting rumours surrounding the film have been made up by an overenthusiastic publicist.

Robbie Williams as Kirk? It's utter stupidity. While we're at it we'll have Cheryl Tweedy play a young Ambassador Delenn in the big screen reimagining of Babylon 5, and I don't know, Buster Bloodvessel to play a young Jean-Luc Picard. Robbie Williams. I'm embarrassed.

Over the last week or so, the things I've watched of minor interest are:

Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip - It's a little too aware of how clever it is, but I still liked it.
The Shield - Best show on television. Friday's episode was particularly grim. If you haven't seen it, do not start watching it now. We're midway through the final series. This isn't like your CSI's where you can watch any episode. Get the DVD boxed sets. I've got season one if you want to borrow it, although I might have leant it to a friend of Friend of Mickey and Davie's TV Rant GP. I'm not sure. All my stuff is in storage so I can't check.

So I still haven't moved. It was supposed to happen on Friday but it didn't. I was furious. I've now been homeless for three weeks and cable/Sky-less for a month. The very thought of what I'm going through makes my heart bleed for myself.

He's still here

2007-07-24T21:30:00.001Z

Yes dear readers. Mickey is still not in his new home. I fear he has become too accustomed to vegetarian chilli and blackberry and apple pie. To be fair to the makem minstrel as many call him, he is not inflicting too much sci-fi dross on me. In fact it has been a case of me educating him in the delights of the Sun Hill's finest in the Bill and I have successfully lured him back into the Walford web.

In addition to this I have started watching Dirt. I quite like it. It is light but does not take itself seriously and having seen 1 episode of Cape Wrath, that is quite relief. I normally like David Morrisey and was interested to see this was being billed as the UK version of Lost. It is not. It is so far up its own backside it cannot almost lick its own lips.

Mickey must go

2007-07-16T18:53:00.000Z

Regular readers of Britain's favourite blog will be aware that Mickey is currently homeless. This has brought some chickens home to roost. Only a month ago I wrote that contrary to popular opinion, Mickey and Davie lived in separate houses and were not a modern day version of Eric and Ernie. Now we do live in the same house and with Mrs Davie working long hours are becoming more like the popular 70's comic duo than ever before. Clearly if I am going to be one of them it will be Eric, the funnier one.

But the house sharing almost came to an abrupt end readers. Why I hear you cry. Because, dear readers, Mickey deleted Thursdays episode of the Bill before I had watched it !! This is the equivalent of me deleting the last in the series of Heroes or Dr Torchwood or Vanished into Space or whatever other tripe is now filling up my sky plus memory !! He is on dangerous ground readers. Luckily he bought some nice food from M&S so I may let him stay a couple more nights.

There's a voice that keeps on calling me

2007-07-11T17:23:00.000Z

This is ridiculous. I'm now homeless thanks to the laziness, intransigence (is that a word?) and laissez faire attitude (is that a phrase and if so, have I got the meaning and context right?) of the legal profession.

Why is it that it is up to me to organise professionals to do their job? I'm rubbish at that sort of thing. You should see the rubbish job I do of it in my own line of business, having to get lawyers to talk to each other is not my speciality. And yet, that's all I seem to be doing right now.

And so I'm living out of a suitcase. My PC and television are sitting in a storage facility somewhere in Throckley, my official address is my parents', and I am living my life with the tune from the Littlest Hobo going through my head on a constant loop.

The Littlest Hobo, as I recall, was rubbish. But I've reconciled myself to the fact that thanks to the theme tune it will now never leave me. And as night follows day, once I've realised I've got The Littlest Hobo in my head, the theme tune to the similarly premised Here's Boomer (which until just now I thought had just been called Boomer) pops in, although in my head it's much jazzier than the original.

I've also had that Paul Young song (about laying his hat) in my head a lot, but that goes very quickly as it's a very poor song, even when it was used for the McEwan's Best Scotch advert or whatever it was.

This is just an aimless ramble. I've got nothing to say.

What Davie and Mrs Davie watched on their television last night:

EastEnders - At one point, one character, can't remember his name, something like Mickey Pierce, but wasn't he on Only Fools and Horses, professed moderate affection to his girlfriend. They were cuddling, and he couldn't see her face, but we could, and she had a troubled look. (cf point 7 in my list of why I don't like EastEnders).
What About Brian - Krista Allen from the Emmanuelle in Space films was in it.
Cape Wrath - Tom Hardy from Star Trek Nemesis (he played Jean-Luc Picard's clone, remember!) was in it. It went on for over an hour and a half. Davie and Mrs Davie didn't catch the end of it as they went to bed.

Hopefully I'll have a new home next time I write, but in case of further lawyer related delays, any readers wishing to put me up for a few days next week, please contact Mickey and Davie's TV Rant at the usual address.

Come on the lawyers

2007-07-09T18:44:00.000Z

Lawyers - get your finger out. You know who you are. You are the people who are handling Mickey's house purchase. However as you have failed to do your job properly, Mickey is now homeless and living with Davie and Mrs Davie. Which my learned legal friends means that I am clogging my sky plus up with episodes of all types of sci-fi rubbish. Mickey has presented me with a list of things to record - Heroes, Dexter, Dirt and anything with Clare Sweeney in. This means I cannot watch the Bill and Eastenders which is all I am really watching at the moment. As one half of Britain's favourite TV bloggers not watching TV is probably not a great move. I may give Dexter a chance. One chance though viewers. Engage me within the first 15 minutes or lose me forever.

Doctor Who and the Lazy One Joke Comedienne

2007-07-04T19:20:00.000Z

Ladies and gentlemen, I write this as half a man. What made me what I am has been taken away from me. I am living in a strange limbo world that resembles my OnDigital years.

Regular readers will be more than aware that I am currently in the process of moving house. I was informed by my solicitors that I'd be moving today, so Virgin took all my stuff away yesterday. Of course, I didn't move today and won't move until at least next week so I'm spending the next week or so without an internet connection or cable television. It's awful. I have to watch television like it's the seventies. I have to sit through the adverts. I started watching The Thick of It last night, and almost immediately decided I needed the toilet, but I couldn't pause. It was hell. An hour of pant-wettingly amusing comedy and me needing to go.

But that's not important. What is important is that someone at the BBC (someone, perhaps it was Russell T Davies, I don't know) decided that it would be a good idea to get Catherine Tate to be the Doctor's new assistant for the whole of the next series. Someone thought that rather than continue the recent trend of great storylines and good actors, they'll take a short cut and go for a familiar face with a personality that will appeal to the Little Britain generation.

It's an absolute disgrace. It's not as though I can give her the benefit of the doubt. I saw the Christmas episode (Christmas episode=rubbish, no exceptions) and it was made less than tolerable by Tate gurning her way through the whole sorry affair. Her character was annoying and ruined the Doctor Who dynamic.

And then you have all the reporting by numbers that goes on. "Is the Doctor bovvered?" reads the headline. Brilliant. It's funny because that's her catchphrase because it's the thing she says every single time she's on the damn television and it's funny because it's recognisable. "The nation has really caught on to this whole "Am I bovvered?" catchphrase, so let's reference it in our headline! It's really funny and what's more, it's really quite clever!" Utter idiots. Not only do they ruin the whole series for me by telling me who the new assistant is going to be, they remind me of that damn catchphrase.

Tate should not be allowed on television again. She should be told in no uncertain terms that if she can't come up with a new joke, she can get a proper job.

The news completely ruined my day and I blame everyone for it.

What I watched on television last night was the following:

The Thick of It - It was very very funny. The Thick of It (and Curb Your Enthusiasm) are proof that swearing is the funniest thing ever.

I'm using Davie's broadband connection for this post by the way. He and Mrs Davie have invited me round for a bit of tea. They've been so very good to me in this my week of shame.

Found our voice have we Ronnie ??

2007-07-02T19:51:00.000Z

The Shield is back. It is brilliant. Dear readers if you have not watched this programme before, shame on you. It is not too late to get into it. Watch this the last series. If you really do like it maybe you can persuade Mickey to lend you the DVD's. The best thing about it in episode 1 was that they have decided that Ronnie, one of the strike team can now have a few lines. poor bloke cannot have said more than 10 words in 5 series. In this first episode of series 6 you could not shut him up. "I know this about this suspect" "Let me go in a calm the hostage situation down" "I'll drive". You could not shut him up. I can imagine that actor David Rees Snell who plays our quiet hero will open his pay packet this Series and kick himself for not having spoken more in the past. It just goes to show David, shy bairns get less than Michael Chiklis.

My other topic for tonight was to be Tycoon - but Mickey has covered it all. Goodbye Jones. Get yourself back to Dragons Den and keep your head down.

And I hear the next series of Doctor Who has been cancelled. Is this correct Mickey ??

EastEnders? Mickey still no like.

2007-06-27T20:39:00.000Z

I don't know what it is about Runaway. I'm watching it but it doesn't really interest me. It's not that I'm insensitive. I think perhaps the problem is that I care too much. Perhaps I've given too much compassion to the world, and so now I have nothing left for Wahlberg and his family as they try to avoid detection by the FBI. Or maybe it's because the premise is a bit too much like the second series of Prison Break and I can't go through that interminable hell again (Sucre trapped under a branch for goodness sake!).

I'm going to do numbering with subheadings. It's easier.

Reason 6
When it was on twice a week, a plot building up over four weeks only took eight episodes of misunderstandings, stalled resolutions and genuine development before the denouement. Now the same plot lasting four weeks needs sixteen episodes. This means the writers have got to drag it out so that it loses any impact. You get the same amount of genuine development (because there's only so much plot) and the rest of the time is filled with these awful scenes where things look as though they're about to happen but in the end don't (maybe because Pat steps in with a cheery comment at just the wrong moment). The producers introduce more characters supposedly to fill out the show with more plots, but in reality the show has become all filler with the odd big event every couple of months.

Reason 7
Talking of those awful scenes where plot development is delayed for at least one episode, the worst is one they use all the time. It's the one where plot progression requires one character to say something to another character, usually something that they'll find difficult to say, something that they've been putting off. So, for example, I don't know, Little Mo needs to tell Billy that there are complications with her pregnancy. Usually this is pre-empted by Little Mo listening in on a conversation between Dot and erm Doctor Trueman where Dot is telling him that she always finds that telling someone something is better than keeping it in.

Little Mo then goes up to Billy, and grasping the nettle says "Billy, I need to tell you something. It's really important."
And then Billy says "Oh yes, I need to tell you something as well."
"Oh what is it you want to say Billy?"
"No, Little Mo, you first."
"No Billy, you first."
"Okay then. I'm really excited about the baby. I've bought this toy and everything. Oh, it's going to be great. And it's so good that there are no complications with the pregnancy or anything. And it is for that reason that I love you Little Mo."
"Oh that's great Billy."
"It is, isn't it. I'd probably kill myself if there were pregnancy complications! Now, Little Mo. What was it you wanted to say to me?"
"Oh, it' s not important. It can wait."
And then they hug, Billy looks happy and relaxed, but zoom in to Little Mo's face. She's looking upset and worried!! DRAMA!!! DUMDUMDUMDUMDUMDUMDUMDUMDUM! CLOSING CREDITS with Billy and Little Mo on the first screen!!!!!

Every other plot has this predictable device stuck in to string the story along for another couple of days. Do the writers think that we're all watching it going, OOH. This is exciting. She almost told him, but then didn't! Have they not learned anything from 24?? Do the terrorists ever say at the end of an episode, "We said we were going to blow the bomb up now but we were just testing you. We won't blow the bomb up for another sixty minutes"? (The answer for those who don't watch 24 is "No Mickey. They appreciate that to maintain drama they need to progress the plot so therefore they don't do that.")

Reason 8
And the fact that every rubbish magazine has the plots of soaps plastered on the covers doesn't help. There was a time when the only plot given away was a quote from the episode. "Poor old Reg" it may or may not have said for the first episode. And now we know exactly what will happen because there is a picture special of the crash into the canal and the bit where Den gets hit and Phil's mad girlfriend destroying Ben's toys. Let us find out for ourselves! Watching a new episode of EastEnders is like watching it for a second time within a week.

Reason 9
Wait, let me think. I know this one. Yes! Characters changing so that they become the same as the actor who plays them. I can only think of two examples. Billy Mitchell, who went from evil cowardly child abuser to tragicomic idiot. And Barry from EastEnders, who went from dodgy dealer with underworld connections who found a contract killer so that Cindy Beale could get Ian killed, to tragicomic idiot.

Reason 10
The episode where Dot did euthanasia on Ethel Skinner was brilliant, and whatever they do after that will always be complete crap in comparison.

And they are my top ten reasons for why I don't watch EastEnders anymore.

The television of note that I watched last night:

Tycoon - It's as bad as they say. It's only like Dragon's Den meets the Apprentice if, when they met, both Dragon's Den and the Apprentice were dead and had been dead for three years. And Peter Jones keeps on moaning about how great and philanthropic he is putting his money on the line here. He's put £180k out of his £200million fortune into it. That's the equivalent of a few quid for the rest of us. And it's done by his production company, so he'd get any income from the programme anyway. And it was probably all his idea to give away the money. And that's why it's been axed from primetime. It's a vanity project. First he drops Richard Farley from Dragon's Den and now he inflicts Tycoon on me. Still, at least he got rid of that freaky kid ("I'm shutting your operation down!" he said. There should have been a follow up programme on ITV2 with Mark Pougatch, "Tycoon: Your operation has been shut down").
Vanished - It's five's US import about an American senator's wife who vanishes and the people who've done it are always one step ahead of the FBI. It's very much like Channel Four's US import Kidnapped, and just as dull. You can really tell that the television companies are scraping the barrel at the moment. Hurry up and get showing the Shield.
Rome - I don't really have much to say about this. It's another one where it's lacking something. I don't really care about it. I don't really look forward to watching it. It'm suffering television compassion fatigue.

This was a very long blog entry. In hindsight I should have split my reasons into three, but I hadn't realised that Reason 7 was going to take so long to articulate. I apologise for the inconvenience.

UK Gold - pure gold

2007-06-26T19:16:00.000Z

Regular readers will know that I am a big fan of the Bill. I love the Bill. They very rarely make mistakes - Mickey referred correctly in my opinion to the Eastenders double headers - too many of them - just because you won an award for doing the first one does not mean you will win one every time John Yorke. No the Bill sticks to what it does best. Apart from the Romania episode. Even though that had my favourite CID character, DS Hunter in it, it was poor - mainly because they put bad background music in to signify the end of a scene. Anyway, I digress. I love the Bill so much I have started recording UK Gold episodes. At first I feared I would remember the plot and it would be boring. Wrong Davie. Wrong. Even though I have a mind like a steel trap I cannot remember what happened in the majority of the episodes and therefore I am getting 5 UK Gold episodes and 2 ITV episodes of one of my favourite programmes a week.

I watched Runaway episode 2 last night. I enjoyed it. Donnie Wahlberg is a good actor and I am starting to be bothered about what happens to the family. I know Mickey is not. Maybe it is because I am more sensitive eh readers ? (Especially the female readers ??)

Mickey no like EastEnders

2007-06-25T17:32:00.000Z

As Davie says, I used to watch EastEnders. In fact I used to be a very big fan. From the moment when Pete Beale, Den Watts, Ali Osman and Andy the Scotsman* bashed open the door to poor old dead Reg's flat, to Alfie Moon's courtship of Kat Slater, I watched every episode. (Apart from the odd one obviously. I'm not an obsessive. And I didn't watch it when I was at University. I was too busy partying with my fellow mathematicians.)

And now I hate EastEnders. For years I've been receiving emails from faithful TV Rant readers begging me for a reason for my change of heart over the popular London based soap opera. For years I have remained silent. Until now.

So, I now give you, in two handy chunks, my top ten reasons why I no longer watch EastEnders (I'd do it in reverse order, but I can't work out how).

Everytime a popular character establishes him (or her) self on the show, they are poached by ITV for a million pound exclusive contract. The actor (or actress) thinks that they've done well in Eastenders, so they're bound to do well playing an ill thought out cop in an ITV Wednesday night drama-by-numbers. And if you've got Hermione Norris playing the wife (or Steven Tompkinson playing the husband), then what can go wrong?? They end up singlehandedly destroying an entire genre. Their careers have stalled, they're stuck in a five year exclusive deal (earning them £20 million per annum) and EastEnders has lost a good character.
Everyone works in and around the Square. If a new character joins the soap who works somewhere else, give it a couple of months and they'll be working on the market, at the Vic, or (if they're intelligent) at Ian Beale's latest business venture. A new businessman will purchase either the car lot or the nightclub. (Is it still called Angie's Den? That name could have been a reason on its own.)
The writers have no perception of how people speak. I remember one episode a few years ago when Phil Mitchell was talking to someone about his alcoholism or something. Maybe he was talking to Sharon, or Mel, or Janet Dibley, I don't know. But he started talking about how it felt, he spoke for five minutes solid describing his life in a metaphor about a train journey or something. There were no awkward pauses while he was trying to think of what he was saying. There were no "erm"s. His audience of one was captivated. It was clearly the writer thinking they were doing this great job at writing a heartfelt and tragic speech. But this was Phil Mitchell talking off the cuff. This man wouldn't have got a single CSE at school and yet he's waxing about how you turn around and realise that the train you thought you were on was going in the opposite direction and the train you're actually on is rushing headlong into a tunnel that has no end. And Mel or Sharon or Janet Dibley is listening to this with a straight face.
The illfated EastEnders Christmas Singalong Special. For the rest of my life I have to live with the memory of watching Shane Ritchie and Jill Halfpenny singing Fairytale of New York in the Caff. It was like a car crash. I couldn't turn away.
The head to head episodes. I remember there was an episode about twenty years ago or something where Dot and Ethel were the only characters and they just chatted about the olden days. It was fairly irrelevant to the plot, but it was well done, people liked it. As a one off, I liked it. Clearly if all EastEnders was just Dot and Ethel chatting about the olden days it wouldn't be very good, but it was an unusual episode. It worked well. So now every couple of weeks they have these double headers. Jim Branning and Sonia have a heart to heart about how Jim should have been a better Grandfather to her and Robbie. Huw and Lennie reminisce about the time they made prank phone calls to Ian Beale. Big Ron and Winston argue about who fancies Angie the most. Too much. And the dialogue is awful again. All the actors think that this is their big chance so they'd better put in a powerful performance (Natalie Cassidy). Let's really act, they think. So they force it out, and everyone watching goes ooh look at Sonia she can really act. Big Ron's tears are so heartrending. I know just how you feel, Huw and Lennie.

I shall continue this later. Don't worry, Barry fans! I'll be making reference to Shaun Williamson in the next five reasons.

The television of note that I watched yesterday:

Doctor Who. Excellent. Really excellent. But not without criticism. Point one, John Simm played the Master a little too wacky for my tastes. You wouldn't get Delgado or Ainley gawping like that (don't know about Pratt or Beevers). Point two, John Simm should have had an evil goatee. Despite these minor issues, he was far better than Eric Roberts.
The Wire. I had to watch some of it with subtitles as I wasn't sure what the characters were saying. But it's very good. The EastEnders writers should watch the Wire to find out how people talk to each other. You don't get McNulty using metaphors about mistakenly getting on the wrong train. He does swear a lot though. And it's the worst kind of swearing, mind, so probably not suitable for your children. There's Mickey's tip for the day for you.

* I may have got this entirely wrong. I'm so very sorry.

Never sing on TV

2007-06-22T09:22:00.000Z

Readers will be getting confused. Firstly a non-rant from Mickey. Now I am about to shock our beloved readers to the core. Last night's episode of Eastenders was appalling. I am a big fan of the London based soap opera. Even in the dark days of 2003-2006 when Mickey, GP (good friend of Mickey and Davie) and Cuddles (a new character for you to wonder about) deserted the show, I stayed loyal. And I have been rewarded by some good episodes. There are good characters residing in e20 right now. Max, Tanya, Stacey, Sean, Shirley, Garry and Patrick to name a few. Even little Darren Miller is turning into a star. But last night's episodes was just poor writing. Dawn Swann (very attractive and not a bad actress) gave birth you see. That in itself is fine. But the scene where she asked Carly Wicks to sing her a song to get through the pain of childbirth nearly made me walk away from TV forever. Of course being a good East end girl, Carly chose "consider yourself one of the family". I am not sure that is the name of the song but you know the one I mean. Not only did she sing it, she did a little Dick van dyke style soft shoe shuffle when singing it. JESUS. They have clearly had this moment planned for years. It was the type of thing you would have imagined Alfie Moon doing and viewers lapping it up. But of course Richie left to do, well not really sure what he does these days, but the idea was there and was going to be put on our screens NO MATTER WHAT. As a wise man once said. What the mind can conceive, the body can achieve.

Doctor Who and the West Indians

2007-06-19T18:16:00.001Z

The first few episodes of Doctor Who this series were okay. Hospitals on the moon. Shakespeare and witches. Father Dougal wearing a cat outfit. Fair enough. Nothing startling. Business as usual if you like.

Then there were the Daleks in New York - with a side plot of an annoying stereotypical showgirl and her pigfaced boyfriend, and the awful humanisation of Dalek Sec which completely missed the point of why Daleks are good. The one with Mark Gatiss turning into a funny spider thing was okay I suppose. After that there was the Cindy Beale in space episode, in which the Doctor got taken over because a star looked at him funny. Rubbish.

But then we've had the last four episodes. Firstly we've got what sounds like a dreadful premise of the Doctor changing into a human, falling in love (with Cheryl from the Royle Family) and getting threatened by scarecrows. These were the best two episodes of Doctor Who since the Peter Davison years (if not the Tom Baker years!). Then there was the one with the funny statues that had funny quantum observation things going on, with the pretty one from Bleak House. It was all internally consistent time paradoxes and that. I really love that sort of thing. Then this Saturday we had what looked to be a pretty run of the mill episode - having avoided spoilers I just thought it was a vehicle for John Barrowman to come back in time for the last two episodes, but it turns out to be the return of clearly the best Doctor Who baddie of all time.

So, I've got nothing bad to say about it. No. Well done, I say. I've doubted Russell T. Davies recently, especially after Torchwood (which was like a series of bad Doctor Who episodes with swearing, and "adult themes" tackled in a really adolescent way. It had better get better this coming series otherwise I may watch it with not much enthusiasm). But these past few episodes have really delivered. In spades, as they say, although I'm not sure what that means.

Seems a bit weak this. And I haven't really watched much telly to talk about in my bulletpointed guide below. Next time I'll think of an advert from the last couple of years that really annoyed me and have a go at that, eh?

My bulletpointed guide to the telly I've watched:

Heroes - Lordy. I like Heroes. I think there are about three or four episodes to go. But I'm moving in a fortnight, and I'll be without the SciFi channel for a bit. After nineteen episodes I'm going to miss the end. Perhaps Davie will record it for me...?
I saw a little bit of a BBC Three new comedy sketch show entitled Touch Me, I'm Karen Taylor. After literally two sketches, I knew exactly what the punchline was going to be in every other sketch. This was because there were only two different sketches being shown, the rest were just those two sketches repeated in slighly different situations. And they weren't funny. Honestly. I really did know what was going to happen. I was disgusted.
Oh, I saw the cricket as well. I went to the test at the Riverside on Friday, but it was rained off. Had really good seats and everything. Very disappointing. Too disappointing even to get angry about. I did get to see the West Indies cricket team and popular bent fingered umpire Billy Bowden though.

Wendy and The Wire

2007-06-18T18:43:00.000Z

Regular readers will know that I have little truck with the news. Don't get me wrong - I am interested in what happens to the world and who is Prime Minister etc. I am after all a highly intelligent man. I just don't watch the news. I see no point in wasting half an hour of my day when I can read the Internet much quicker than Huw Lewis can get through his script. I do however retain a soft spot for Look North. When you watch Look North it is like watching an old friend. It is comfortable. So readers, imagine my excitement when on Thursday night I met Look North's very own Wendy Gibson. She was hosting an awards night for people who add up and do other complicated sums. People like our good friend Mickey or Mrs Davie. She was very pleased to get the chance to talk to a non-sums person like me. We got chatting but it soon became apparent she was not going to get me a part on the Bill so as soon as I had finished my champagne I left her to it. Still it was exciting to meet a TV star.

Mickey lent me the first 3 episodes of the Wire this weekend. I have watched the first episode. I like it. No dramatic ending like in 24 or the Shield, but a satisfying start. Given the choice of that or the latest drivel that Cowell is serving up on ITV, there is only one winner. I will keep readers updated as to the progress of this series. I do have high hopes but Wendy let me down so maybe the Wire will to.

Celebrity Masterchef Returns To A Normal Size

2007-06-07T18:27:00.000Z

"Celebrity Masterchef is back," she announces dramatically, as the camera pans to show Greg grinning and John looking a little serious.

John and Greg then explain to each other about how the celebrities will have to cook well if they want to win the competition. This is interspersed with footage of said celebrities explaining how they would like to win the competition.

And as the title comes up on screen saying "Celebrity Masterchef", she announces (dramatically) "It's Celebrity Masterchef!"

During the next half hour she then explains (dramatically) who the celebrities are.

("Sue Cook is the well loved television presenter." Well loved? Sue Cook? She's not disliked, I grant you, but would you put her in the same league as Norman Wisdom?)

She goes on to explain what the celebrities are about to do. She then explains (dramatically) what the celebrities are doing. She also reminds us (dramatically) what the celebrities have done. All very dramatic, all building up the tension, all speculating on what will happen next.

"Spider off of Coronation Street impressed with his tuna and cheese melt in the invention test, and he excelled in the professional kitchen. But will he be able to keep up this great form in the Final Test?

"Her out of Cash In The Attic had mixed reviews for her spaghetti hoops, and she struggled with the pressure of the professional kitchen. But will she be able to I don't know do better in the Final Test?" Etc.

It's easy to just ignore her rubbish narration, but if you actually take time to listen to what she is saying, really concentrate, you realise that she's just talking for the sake of talking. She adds nothing. There. Is. No. Need. For. Her. To. Be. There.

She's always been on it, it's just that I hadn't really noticed how annoying it was until it was pointed out to me. By my mother. It really riles Mickey's Ma. And now it really riles Mickey.

And how come all the programmes I like get cancelled and that's it, while the absolute rubbish which was Jericho has a few fanboys sending peanuts to some CBS executives and suddenly they're all, "ooh let us make you another seven episodes fanboys!"? And now I hear that the best television series ever, Battlestar Galactica, has only one series left. I just hope they do a reimagining of Galactica 1980 as a follow up series.

And SrAlan didn't fire that awful fame seeking want-to-be (as I like to call them), she pulled out herself just so she can get a story in the Daily Mail. Let's all agree from now on, if she's ever on television again (and she will be) we all just turn over.

Oh, and well done Sky for taking Prison Break from Channel five. Once again you take anything half decent away from free to air television and force people to pay for your damn dish. "This edge-of-the-seat drama is the perfect addition to our must-see slate of US programming." says David Smyth, head of acquisitions at Sky One. Does your mother know what you do for a living, Smyth? Can you look your children in the eye, Smyth? Can you?? Smyth??

Here's my television viewing from the night before:

The Apprentice and The Apprentice You're Fired - So farewell Lohit. You were my tip (based purely on appearances, remember) for winning this year's series. Though I knew that you would never win once you opened your mouth, it was always good to see you progress further than Davie's and friend of Mickey and Davie's TV Rant, GP's tips. This means that I win the tile with a picture of a chimpanzee sitting on the toilet and holding a banana, which was mine in the first place and which I wouldn't have given away had I lost.

Million dollar smile

2007-06-03T18:54:00.000Z

Michael. That is right. I flashed my million dollar smile at the Channel 4 execs and hey presto they buy another series of What about Brian. Ask me to do the same to the execs at Sky one and you may get another series of Battlestar Far Trek or whatever it is called.

It is Sunday evening and I am very excited about the finale of 24. Through reading some website which I don't normally do, I have discovered that there potentially could be a face from Jack's past returning tonight. They do generally end 24 very well. Jack crying, Jack having to go off into a life being called Frank, and then the Chinese bloke getting Jack and within 3 minutes getting from the city airport to the docks, boarding a cargo ship bound for China, beating him up and getting a good 20 miles out to sea. I cannot wait to see what they do tonight. I think, and viewers of Britain's most loved blog will know my predictions recently have been poor (the Dr to win the Apprentice - what was I thinking ?), it will be Tony Almeida.

Did not watch much TV last night. It was Saturday night. However Mickey and Davie sat up with a whiskey and saw Justin Lee Collins, or JLC as Mickey calls him try and re-unite the Dallas cast. Did not really care but it was disturbing to see how wrinkly actress Susan Howard's neck looked. She played Donna Krebs for those who are interested. I imagine readers are excited and now believe Mickey and Davie live in the same house like Eric and Ernie. We do not and I can report Mickey got a taxi home at about 12.30am.

What about What about Brian?

2007-05-31T17:55:00.000Z

HAH A HAH AH AHA HAA. Look what me funnee did? I'm so very clever and amusing.

Davie has just experienced what happens all the time with my programmes. Cancellation without resolving the plot.

Farscape ended with the two heroes being shattered into thousands of pieces by an unknown alien. Twin Peaks ended with Agent Dale Cooper taken over by Killer Bob laughing into the mirror as Heather Graham did something or other in the bathroom (or something, I'm writing from memory here). The Tripods ended with Will and Beanpole (played by Ceri Seel as I remember) getting back to their camp only to find that the Tripods appeared to have killed everyone. All because some tv executive knows that I quite enjoy the programme.

All the programmes Dave has ever watched either go on forever (e.g. The Bill) or end naturally with all plot loose ends tied up (e.g. The West Wing, NYPD Blue).

But now Davie, the boot is on the other foot. Now you can feel the frustration that I feel of never knowing how David Boreanaz and his rag-tag band of followers got out of the big fighty situation they were in when Angel got cancelled. You will relive Brian's argument over and over again in your sleep just like I still wake up hearing Avon's laughter at the end of Blake's Seven.

(I once saw Blake out of Blake's Seven. I was going into the gents and he was coming out of the gents. It wasn't that much of a coincidence though as it was at a Blake's Seven convention.)

Anyway, my point is that it always happens to me and you don't catch me complaining. Apart from when I complained about it a few posts ago.

And another thing. What About Brian has been cancelled but because Channel Four are so far behind, you've still got another series to watch. Davie's fallen on his feet once again. Just like always.

Here are my thoughts on the reality programmes which were on television last night:

Apprentice and Apprentice You're Fired - An absolute mockery. How S'rAlan could sack Naomi after Simon's utter disaster of an effort is beyond me. Still, Lohit's still in it, although I can't see him getting past the interviews. Kristina and Tre will make it past the interviews and Kristina will win. Whey, that's Mickey's tip for you.
Oh, and another Mickey's tip for the producers of The Apprentice You're Fired - Stop putting that awful twisted nasty woman on my television. If there's anyone I hate more than Jennie Bond, it's Vanessa Feltz with her populist rants and "outrageous but a lot of sense when you think about it" opinions. I hate Feltz more than I hate Katie.
Big Brother - What a great bunch of people. I hope the twins win. They look like a lot of fun! I wish I'd been in the crowd! And all female! What an intriguing twist!

I was actually going to write about the welcome return of Masterchef in its Summer Celebrity format but I got sidetracked by Davie's What About Brian thing, and when I'd thought of that Brilliant title for this blog entry I decided that CM must wait. Don't worry, Opinions-about-John-and-Gregg fans! I'll have some hilariously witty observations about them next time.

What about Brian

2007-05-30T18:31:00.000Z

Michael. As summer approaches we are generally happy at the thought of test cricket and bbq's with art competitions at our good friend the Prince's house. However summer has a downside. The end of Lost, 24, Prison Break. Ok there is the Shield to look forward to. I think I read, but I may have dreamed that it begins on a Tuesday this year. Mistake on Five's part - they should put it on Sunday. But like you I am now searching for the next big thing. What am I going to watch through the summer that is going to grip me. I gave up Big Brother last year and have no intention of going back, unless there are a lot of pretty girls. I decided to give "What about Brian?" a go. Initially because the way the Guardian TV guide described it, it seemed to be an opportunity to compare Brian to you Michael. But it was mildly interesting, had some attractive lead women and the story about one of the couples having an open marriage was new. Brian's obsession with his best mate's other half was also handled quite well. But, just as I am getting in to it - Series 1 finishes. After 5 episodes. Just as everything is developing. And to make things worse there is no second series. So the cliffhanger which involved Brian's best mate overhearing Brian and his mrs arguing is now irrelevant as there will not be a second series. Why did the writers not pen one more episode to finish it off? Frankly I am angry.

The Eight Deaths of Television

2007-05-26T10:02:00.000Z

Hey now Davie. I know Richard was your favourite. He was my favourite as well. Him being sacked from DD is an injustice and a travesty, but the death of television? Surely that's something that will happen this week when BB8 starts.

Yes, I've cunningly started this post by referencing Davie's last post then shoehorning in a reference to what I really want to write about. Big Brother.

Summer is about to start and all the good programmes on television have finished or will finish within weeks. The magnificent Battlestar Galactica finished a couple of weeks ago (great ending by the way). 24 and Lost will finish within the next week and a bit. I think Day Break might be about to end as well (Day Break is really good! It's about a cop forced to live the same day over and over again like in that film, and each episode he gets closer to find out who has framed him for murder. And he does a little narrative at the start which is reminiscent of Jack Bauer's "longest day of my life" narrative at the start of the first series of 24. I'm really enjoying it).

Oh and there are only three more Apprentices.

So the point I'm making is that apart from Doctor Who, Heroes and the Daily Show, that'll be it for Mickey's viewing in Summer.

It's not a new problem, it's just that this year I've decided that I'm not going to watch Big Brother (you see, it's all coming together).

Firstly because it's all been done before, they can't top BB3 with Alex and Jade before she was famous, and no amount of intrahouse conflict will be as good as the almost violent BB5.

Secondly because I hate all housemates once they've left the house and think that it can be used as some sort of springboard to a career in the media and a showbiz lifestyle. Look at Davie and me, we've sweated blood over our careers. It's only after months of hard work delivering opinions that we can now hob nob with the likes of the Rugby League correspondent from the York Evening Press. And yet the likes of Doris from Big Brother 4 thinks that a couple of weeks sleeping in a house with the dullest people in the country entitles her to my lifestyle? I think not, Doris. I think not.

Finally because of Davina McCall. Her awful gawping at the camera, her sly winks and knowing chuckles, her viciously offensive assumption that we're watching Big Brother because of her. She's not as bad as Jennie Bond, but she's close. She's very close.

I'll watch the first one, just to see who's in it. Y'know.

Friday's viewing

GBM - The results show. The results were that for each course the public agreed totally with the judges, so having a public vote was a complete waste of time, money and effort, just like I implied in my last post. This proves that I am excellent. The starter and the fish course both contained a lot of egg so if they invite me to the Ambassador's Dinner in Paris I shall decline as I am no fan of the egg.
The Aristocrats - An unusual film where a lot of comedians discuss an unamusing but offensive joke that is popular amongst comedians.
Have I Got News For You - Alexander Armstrong was the host. I was at University with Alexander Armstrong. I never spoke to him. He was one of the cool kids and I was a mathematician from the North East. But now look at us.

Jones and Theo - shame on you

2007-05-22T19:26:00.000Z

Regular readers of Britain's best loved blog will know that I am a big fan of Dragons Den. I also admire Aussie dragon, Richard because he treats people with respect and even if he is not going to invest does not see the need to try and demean them like good old Dunc or crack a prescripted wisecrack like Jones. He does not lead them down the garden path only to say he is not interested in investing like one trick pony Deborah. Or perhaps he does not talk about his fantastic retail experience every single minute like the Greek lad. So why, BBC and I'm looking at you in particular Evan Davis has Richard been dropped from the panel. Was it because he was being nice to people ? Was he taking too much interest in their product and asking intelligent questions as to the viability of the product ? Was he actually investing in these hapless dreamers ? Or was he just getting on certain dragon's nerves ? Television died last night ladies and gentlemen.

Another rant at an out of date advert

2007-05-22T18:11:00.000Z

What is it with people in adverts? Do advert makers deliberately make them stupid?

We used to have the More Than family, who demonstrate the wisdom of having insurance by recklessly allowing their out of control dog to go around and nearly cause fatal accidents, to which the family just look at each other, sigh and say a crappy catchphrase.

There was the one where the dog (I believe him/her to be called Lucky) is left in a car parked on a slope whereupon he/she takes off the handbrake and almost causes the deaths of countless young mothers and their babies.

Firstly, don't leave a dog in a car with a dodgy handbrake. Simple enough. It's an accident waiting to happen.

Secondly, leave the car in gear. If it's pointing downhill then put it in reverse, uphill put it in first. If the gear holds then the car won't move.

Thirdly, steer the wheels so that they point to the kerb, that way the car rolls into the kerb and stops.

Three simple little rules. Not too difficult to remember. Still, they had car insurance, so the replacement vehicle and speedy claims process would have made up for the lifelong guilt, shame and hatred from society had the car actually crashed into a child.

The utter irresponsibility of this disgraceful family is then shown again when they go to a summer fete. The idiot parents have got no control over the jonah dog or their idiot children, so they barely have stopped when the kids open the door (CHILDLOCKS FOR GOD'S SAKE!) the dog runs out.

So what do they do? In the middle of a busy fete? With children and families running around having a carefree pleasant time?

They get back in the car and drive after the dog. Oblivious to the fact that just a year ago they almost caused the deaths of three young mothers after the handbrake incident, having learnt nothing from the potentially life destroying near miss, they speed into the crowd after the dog like the irresponsible halfwits that they are.

And the numbskull father isn't even looking where he's going! He's looking at his wife! KEEP YOUR EYE ON THE ROAD YOU UTTER MORON! Even if you forget about the countless families you could crash into, what about the fact that you've just driven into what seems to be a stock car race! Your children are in the back! Did you not see what happened to Ayrton Senna? Racing is a killer. And you're not insured for it. And yet still he turns to his wife with a bemused expression that says, eeh what fun.

So seeing he's in a near death situation he continues to drive, at clearly stupid speeds, and proceeds to win the race. His family are in the back! His children. Risking their lives. And what do the fete and race organisers do? Do they call the police and get him done for reckless driving, causing danger to the lives of others? Do they ban him from the fete for ruining the car race? Do they recognise him as the reckless fool who almost killed the mayor's wife and child when his car ran down a hill a year ago?

No, they cheer and give him the prize, even though he only did half a lap, and he didn't have the right type of car and he wasn't entered into the race in the first place.

He and his family are a disgrace to mankind. Put them in a rocket and send them into the Sun. Let them burn.

Monday night's viewing consisted of the following:

GBM - Brilliant, now the public can choose who wins. Let's get a bit of interaction here. Now Mickey can choose who wins. It's all I've ever wanted, the empowerment to influence a cookery competition. All these weeks I've watched helpless as Fort, Leath and the other one choose the winners without my say so, but now the boot is on the other foot.
Prison Break - Surprisingly there seemed to be a coherence to the plot that has been lacking of late. It appears that the writers may have a plan for the next few episodes, probably as it's coming to the end of the season. Oh will they Break out of the Prison? I for one cannot wait to discover the answer to this question.
Heroes - It's really really good. Christopher Ecclestone is in it now, but not in this episode. And George Takei off of Star Trek was in last week and his car registration was NCC 1701. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. But then I realised I was crying already. Crying over my empty life.

Relax James

2007-05-20T16:47:00.001Z

Michael. I read with interest your thoughts on MGL. As you know I quite like to cook myself. Often on a Saturday morning I will get up and Mrs Davie will ask me to cook her some breakfast. I often do this with Saturday morning kitchen as my background noise. I like James Martin. He seems like a good bloke and in recent month he has had Tony Hadley, Britain's most underrated singer and some of the Bill cast on as guests. His food is relatively straight forward and he does that omlette challenge thing with the professional chefs. But James, in recent weeks I have noticed that you have taken to presenting the whole show with a suit jacket on. This is not natural. I do not get home at night and start cooking for Mrs Davie whilst still wearing my suit jacket. And Michael I wager neither do you. I wonder if it is a BBC rule and therefore James has no choice. It is disturbing me though and I wonder what is next. Little Matt Dawson wearing a tie for Question of Sport?

Great British Menu

2007-05-17T20:01:00.000Z

What did I say about Great British Menu a few weeks ago? In my usual eloquent style I stated:

"I can't stand Jennie Bond, the chefs are smug and full of "personality" and the
judges are git pompous and they like strange stuff like eggs. But yet, for some
reason, it's perfect viewing."

Well, this evening, what is supposed to be a relaxing show, one that I can watch while eating my tea (I had burgers, mini rostis and baked beans tonight readers!), was not perfect viewing at all.

This week is the Northern England heat, where two chefs battle it out (imagine that battle it out is being said with emphasis, with pursed lips and squinting eyes) over who will be chosen to represent the North of England when they do some big dinner for a lot of French foodies.

Firstly I've been annoyed at the way these supposed northern chefs (both based in London) are both from Lancashire, and have chosen literally no food from north of Barrow-in-Furness or East of the Pennines. That's been really annoying - a region from Chester in the South West to Berwick in the North East, and all their food has been from Lancashire and Cheshire with the exception of a sheep from Ulverston. (By the way, my computer is really really slow today. I'm getting really furious.)

But what has really annoyed me is the steady drip drip drip of Jennie Bond's incessant commentary over everything that is going on. I loathe Jennie Bond. She looks like a cross between Princess Anne (the Princess Royal as some like to call her) and Katie from the Apprentice. She's got this attitude about her which says, "hey, you might have thought I was stuffy royal correspondent Jennie Bond, but in reality I'm a bit of a good time girl! I can have a laugh with the best of them. I'm witty, good for a joke, and I can add to any situation simply with my presence."

First of all she comes into the kitchen and puts a bit of personality into proceedings. She flirts with the chefs, asks them questions about their food, all with her awful Princess Katie face and her "hey, you might have thought I was stuffy royal correspondent Jennie Bond, but in reality I'm a bit of a good time girl! I can have a laugh with the best of them. I'm witty, good for a joke, and I can add to any situation simply with my presence" attitude.

And then there are the voice-overs. It's bad enough that her narration was written by the same person who wrote Lisa Riley's lines during her ill-fated stint as host of You've Been Framed. It adds nothing to the programme, it just serves to annoy. Why, after the two chefs have had a discussion about whether their food is British enough, do I need to hear Jennie Bond saying "Let's say the chefs have agreed to disagree."? Does that add anything? When there's been another argument her saying "Things are heating up in the kitchen" is completely redundant. Seriously, some people really do need to just shut their stupid faces up.

But the worst thing is the way that the writer of the voice overs keeps on putting French words in the narration. I've no problem with that. What I've got a problem with is Jennie Bond's stupid way of putting on some plummy semi-French accent to say a french word that has common usage in English. She said Creme de Frambois or something like that this episode and I shouted obscenities at the television. It's the first time I've ever sworn at the television while watching a cookery programme that doesn't have Antony Worrell-Thompson or Ainsley Harriott in it.

And she never says "superb". She says "ssyyyewperrb". If she's never on television again that's not good enough. I want a written apology from the BBC for inflicting her awfulness on my television.

It's the final of the Northern heat tomorrow, and then next week, it's some sort of final or semi-final or something. I don't want anyone to win. I hate them all now. I'll still watch it though.

As well as the Apprentice and the Apprentice You're Fired, last night I watched:

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart (Yesterday Jeremy Paxman was the guest. It was a bit strange that. He seemed a little nervous. I was disappointed.
GBM (Jennie Bond was annoying, the two chefs cooked produce from Lancashire)
Property Ladder (It was a revisited one. Rather than just call it a repeat, cut out a couple of scenes from an earlier show and add five minutes of new footage. Well done Channel Four for killing television just a little bit more.
I caught a glimpse of some Ten Pin Bowling on Sky Sports. The top left corner of the screen was taken up by a bloke doing sign language. Sign language for ten pin bowling commentary. Have I missed something?

Davie, I'd bring round my Battlestar Galactica DVDs for when 24 and Lost finish, but our regular reader Cuddles has still got them. Cuddles, when you're finished with them, pass them on to Davie, there's a good lad!

What next Mickey

2007-05-15T21:55:00.000Z

Mickey Mickey Mickey. I do not have the inclination to go into a debate re Futurama. It would require me to watch a half hour episode to pick more holes in it and I really cannot be bothered to do that. If I watched an episode then I would be breaking one of Davie's golden rules. My other golden rules, dear readers include only drinking Guiness in its country of origin and never ever allowing Julia Roberts in the house.

But, it is time to start facing facts. My dream Sunday night of 24 then Lost is soon to be no more for another 9 months. Only a few episodes remain so I am auditioning new shows to take their place. I know I have the Shield which will hopefully be back soon. At least I know that Channel 5 will not mess around with it like Channel 4 dd with NYPD Blue. But I need something else. I am tempted by the Unit as it has the President from 24 in it. Maybe Denis Haysbert has a golden touch when it comes to choosing series to star in ? But it is on Bravo. I am giving What about Brian a chance and whilst it is entertaining in a mindless Tuesday night way I am not sure it has what it takes to fire me up on a Sunday night. Mickey will no doubt encourage me to give Battle Star Galactica in the 25th Century Wars a go, bu as regular readers will know, DDDS-F (Davie don't do Sci-Fi).

Good News Everybody

2007-05-10T17:26:00.000Z

So, after a busy couple of days I turned on my computer this evening, and, not wanting any trouble, had a quick look at Mickey and Davie's TV Rant only to see Futurama being labelled a "laboured copy" of the Simpsons by my blogging colleague Davie. And this despite him freely admitting that he's never watched a full half hour of it.

Shame on you, Davie. Shame on you. Futurama was easily the equal to the Simpsons, and what is more, it never had a dodgy first season where the animation was rubbish and everyone's voice was different. When they cancelled it, my heart broke. (It was around about the same time as they cancelled Farscape. 2003 was a bad year for science fiction shows beginning with F. They also cancelled Firefly at the same time, but I didn't watch that as the first couple of episodes were a little dull, and I had bad indigestion so couldn't concentrate. I'll buy the DVDs at some point.)

The thing about Futurama was that it was really really good. Please. Allow me to expand.

Futurama, right? It was funny, right? And all the characters and that in it, were really good and funny and that. And the stories and situations were really good and funny. And they had an episode where they had all the original Star Trek characters in, except there was a new one called Welshie. And some git funny things happened. And they have jokes based on computers and that. It's really funny.

And despite all this, despite the funniness, the characters and that, the stories and situations, despite all of it, they cancelled Futurama.

But following the success of Family Guy or something, they're bringing it back. This makes me extremely happy. It'll be on Sky One though.

On television last night were the following things that I watched:

Apprentice and Apprentice You're Fired - (As usual. Wednesday night is Apprentice Night. (For those readers who are keeping a spreadsheet of where each week's Apprentice Night is being held, this time was the turn of Friend of Mickey and Davie's TV Rant, GP, to cook us all a nice bit of gnocchi.) I think Katie's throwaway comment about Northerners may cause her problems in later life, the nasty bitch.)

And for all you readers who have been wondering how my trip to Grantham went, let's just say I drank a little too much the night before the conference. I sort of covered it up well, but I had to run out at one point. Bad Mickey. Very. Bad. Mickey.

And yet

2007-05-07T16:12:00.000Z

Michael. I read with interest your rant against the great British sketch show and agree wholeheartedly. It is nothing but lazy TV. But, Mickey may I remind you and let the readers know that on Saturday night you cried like a girl when I switched a re-run of Futurama off. I have never sat and watched a full half hour of this programme. I see no point. I like the Simpsons. I do not watch it religiously but I like it. This Futurama seems a laboured copy. And that Mickey is also lazy TV.

Watched 24 and Lost last night as it was Sunday. Brilliant the both. It is almost like the writers of Lost have suddenly realised they have only 4 more episodes and have a lot to finish off so are trying to squeeze it all in. 24 was its usual brilliant self. It is Bank holiday today and Mrs Davie is watching re-runs of Pride and Prejudice. That Lizzie Bennett was quite nice. Hopefully Darcy will have got her into ye olde sack before Prison Break starts at 10pm.

The British Sketch Show Again

2007-05-02T21:59:00.000Z

Can you please allow me this opportunity to write once again about sketch shows. In particular Ruddy Hell It's Harry and Paul. I was right. Three episodes in and it's as funny as a Little Britain Christmas Special (with special guest Catherine Tate).

What Harry Enfield and Paul Whitehouse (and maybe their writers if they don't do it all themselves, I don't know, I haven't checked) have done is literally write enough material for one single half hour of comedy, some of it unfunny.

They've then repeated the same material over and over again. Yes, yes, I've written about this sort of thing in an earlier entry. But where they've differed from Little Britain, or Catherine Tate, is that they haven't put the sketches in slightly different settings. They've just done the same sketches, in the same settings, with perhaps a bit of a different conversation.

So, we have the posh builders talking about Stephen Fry one week, and Alan Yentob another. In one sketch, Nelson Mandela tries to sell alcopops, and the next sketch he's selling absinthe in the same manner. Bill Gates and Steve Jobs get overexcited about computers in the same party every week. I got the joke the first time. If I want to enjoy it again, I can watch the programme again. I don't need it repeating. I'm not stupid.

This week's was particularly bad as there were about five (very small) sketches where Harry Enfield asks Paul Whitehouse for different Barbican branded products. These were about as amusing as the death of a much loved pet and the repetition was like reliving the awful body discovery over and over again.

Very soon, comedy sketch shows will consist of one sketch filmed in front of a green screen being repeated on an endless loop with minor changes to the background on every reset. The children will love it. But society will have broken down by then and we'll all be dying of special space diseases.

Didn't really watch much last night, I was out you see

I did watch the Apprentice tonight though, and it was the best yet. Lohit was team leader and completely whipped Paul's sorry behind. I can't believe how much everyone has it against Adam. He's got a bit of a miserable demeanour about him, and he made a bit of a mess of the marketing, but if all he lost you was a maximum of £50, and you lost by £600, then you can't blame the poor lad. He did his best, bless him. So, I want Adam to win now. Or maybe Kristina as she really laid into Paul. I'm also very disturbed to find that I'm five years older than Katie. I'd have put the vicious harridan at least ten years older than me.

I'm off to Grantham tomorrow for a conference! I'm going to ask questions on technical things that are work related! Wish me luck readers!

Those Aussies

2007-05-01T18:26:00.000Z

Mickey. Thank god that World Cup is finished. It has almost killed my interest in the game. And readers, just like Mickey I am a big fan. I love leather on willow. I was out on Saturday with Mrs Davie but she did not want dessert so I got home in time to see the farcical ending. Shame on the umpires and well done the Aussies. Talking of the Aussies I am disturbed to read that the BBC may lose Neighbours. Why would they do that? Why ? Don't get me wrong - although I can still name the actors name of any character who lived in Ramsey Street between its inception and about 2002, I rarely see it these days. It's not because I do not like it it is just I have a job now and that involves making people's dreams come true. Unfortunately that cannot just happen between the hours of 9 and 5. Occasionally I will read ahead in the News of the World magazine and if Paul Robinson (Stefan Dennis) is doing something really bad then I may record it and watch it, but it no longer forms the core of my day like in the halycon days of 1990-1992. But I like to know it is there on BBC. I don't think I would feel as safe knowing Five or ITV have it. They ruin things you see.

Doctor Who and the Australians

2007-04-29T19:13:00.000Z

Davie, what did Lohit do wrong in the last Apprentice? Yes, he didn't say or do anything in the whole episode apart from printing out labels that didn't look so good, and yes, he made the mistake of not pretending to be Natalie's best friend in the whole world. But apart from that, he did okay. I'm slightly worried that at some point he'll have to be a team leader, which may cause problems with his strategy of not saying or doing anything at all ever.

Last night's television was very disappointing. I watched two things. The Cricket World Cup Final and Doctor Who.

First of all I shall write about Doctor Who. It was part two following on from the cliffhanger last week where Dalek Sec had mutated into a dalek/human hybrid. It was all a little stupid. The daleks are supposed to be git hard, but they only killed Hugh Quarshie. And the Doctor kept on just wandering up to them sometimes with a suicide wish and other times with a certainty that they weren't going to shoot him. There was no threat from them, no sense of true danger.

Back in the first series the writers did well by making daleks deadly - one dalek made the Doctor almost wet himself with fear, yet these ones just seemed to be just another monster.

And they have this potentially interesting villain with a dalek creature thing as a head, and what do they do with him? Make him a scientist type with a good nature so that half the episode is him and the Doctor trying to do some special experiments. It was like a weak episode of Star Trek The Next Generation that I've just made up where Geordie La Forge and a friendly Borg decide to join forces to solve a problem with the food replicators. Except Star Trek The Next Generation would have a secondary plot where, I don't know, Data is being taught how to eat ice cream by Wesley Crusher and Deanna Troi. And the ice cream would come from the replicators but the inconsistency in the plot wouldn't have been noticed because the writers were rubbish.

Seriously, I used to really like Star Trek The Next Generation, but when I think about it, it was rubbish! Really weak. At least it was better than Voyager and Enterprise. And I watched every episode. That reminds me. I've got the complete video collection for Star Trek Deep Space Nine if anyone wants to buy them from me. In very good condition. All 173 episodes on 88 tapes. Only watched once. VHS format. Anyone?

So, that was the disappointing Doctor Who. Then there was the equally disappointing Cricket World Cup Final. Australia won easily, just like they won every other match they played. Regular readers will know I like cricket, me, but this tournament was dreadful. Out of seven hundred games played over the three years that this world cup has been running, there were only three good ones, and I missed those. I saw all six hundred and ninety seven of the others.

Adam Gilchrist plays a ridiculous innings which completely ruins the game as a competition. And then at the end, they have to play in darkness because the referees (or umpires as I like to call them) didn't understand the rules.

The only good thing was that by the end it was so dark that you couldn't see the smug self satisfied faces of the Australians as they bullied yet another team into submission. I don't know what it is about them, I'm sure they're all nice people, but the Australian cricket team just annoy me so much. The way McGrath holds up the ball every time he gets a five wicket haul. It's just all look at me look at me I'm Glenn McGrath me aren't I great?

Mickey's tv viewing last night bullet pointed for your convenience

Doctor Who (Brilliant! A human dalek hybrid, but with a twist! My favourite bit was when the Doctor tried to sacrifice himself in order to save the faceless New Yorkers in Hooverville. Powerful stuff. Kudos to the writers!)
Cricket World Cup Final (Well done to the Australians! There's no denying it, they're a great cricket team! Perhaps the greatest! Oh what I'd give to see them play against the West Indies sides of the seventies and eighties! Adam Gilchrist's innings was sublime! Probably the finest batting performance ever in a world cup final. And what a great send off for Glenn McGrath. Well done Pigeon! I will miss your metronomic precision and justified self-confidence.)

Hey everyone. Did you see what I did there? Mmmm? Did you??

Mickey's boy

2007-04-27T19:20:00.000Z

Regular readers will know that Wenesday night is Apprentice night. I cooked chilli this week and The Prince, Mrs Prince, Mrs Davie and Mickey all enjoyed some spicy meat and tortillas before settling down to watch this week's episode. The two teams had to select an artist and sell their paintings. At the beginning of the series I chose Sophie the Quantum physicist to win. She was fired by Sir Alan last week after stupidly admitting that she did not enjoy selling which was probably the worst thing she could have told the cockney barrow turned multi-millionaire. I was angry that she had done this after I had given her my support at the beginning of the series and invested a lot of time into making t-shirts and mugs with "Come on Sophie" in a contemporary design. (Not all of that sentence is true). Now both mine and the Prince's picks have gone meaning Mickey's choice has won the mini challenge. Mickey has backed Lohit who has somehow managed to spend 5 episodes without saying a word. He has appeared in all the episodes and always as looks busy but he has never actually spoken. I think Mickey took this as a sign that he must be some form of genius. Luckily as the number of candidates dwindle, Mickey's boy has to speak more and more. Well he had to utter 2 sentences this week. That was enough to make it clear that Mickey's boy will not be winning this series. And that makes me happy.

Teatime viewing

2007-04-19T18:03:00.000Z

Regular readers will know I was a big fan of Masterchef Goes Large (MGL). It was a great accompaniment to my February and March weekday tea, watching amateur cooks slave over exquisitely cooked venison and "delightful" puddings while I eat my microwave lasagne and "Amore" yoghurt.

Of course, it ended last month so I've been eating my tea while watching the cricket world cup of late. But that'll soon finish. What am I, Mickey off of Mickey and Davie's TV Rant, going to watch as my tea-time accompaniment? It must be something that doesn't require total attention, (so that I can glance down at my food and I don't dribble), and it must be something that won't make me laugh (in case I laugh at the wrong time and choke to death - I live alone remember. No-one to save me.)

The Great British Menu (hereafter known as TGBM) is the unlikely solution to my dreadful situation. I can't stand Jennie Bond, the chefs are smug and full of "personality" and the judges are git pompous and they like strange stuff like eggs. But yet, for some reason, it's perfect viewing. And (Davie won't like this but) they don't explain how to make the dishes. They just cook them. I don't feel guilty about my pie and crinkle cut oven chips being worse than the fillet of beef with twenty different types of onion because there's no expectation that I should be able to make it.

(In this case, of course, my pie and crinkle cut oven chips is better than the fillet of beef with twenty different types of onion. For one thing the beef is utterly underdone, the chef has stuck it in a bowl of lukewarm tapwater for ten seconds and that's it cooked. And who wants twenty different types of onions? I admit there's always a bit of burping after my fish and chips, but it's much more pleasant for everyone than the violently smelly belches that'll come up after all them onions. Twenty different types by the way, count 'em.)

Here's what I watched yesterday evening:

(I was round Haysto's and friend of Mickey & Davie's TV Rant, GP's house for Apprentice night. This week Haysto cooked a magnificent chickpea curry with deep fried aubergines. It really put my burgers from last week to shame. Who's cooking next week, Davie?)

Property Ladder (One couple completely ignored Sarah's advice and their flat conversion turned into a total shambles grinding to a demoralising halt. I was very pleased. I violently hate anybody who goes on Property Ladder and ignores Sarah's advice. She is a professional. She knows what she's talking about. People on Property Ladder are utter idiots. They've got free advice from a professional and they ignore it. I'll bet she was really pleased when she saw what a mess they'd made of things. The only problem was that it wasn't their money. So they probably couldn't care less. This makes me angry.)
The Apprentice and The Apprentice: You're Fired (In which Davie's girl, Sophie the quantum physicist was fired. As the blokey with glasses whose name escapes me (I've just looked it up. Andy) was fired in the first week, this means that I win the Apprentice-Pick-The-Winner-Before-The-Series-Starts-Based-Purely-On-Appearance competition that I had with Davie and friend of Mickey and Davie's TV Rant, GP. My tip (based purely on appearance before watching the series remember) Lohit's still in it. I think he's certain to be in the final four at least.)

I think I'll watch last week's Peep Show tonight. I like Peep Show. Mark off of Peep Show reminds me of me.

Why Brian ? Why

2007-04-17T19:35:00.000Z

Let's move on from the annoying 13 year old Mickey. We have given her more than her fair share of fame. As I type this I have some property channel on. It is showing a programme called VIP Househunter. Someone called Rosie is looking for a house for ex-footballer Brian Deane. Apparently she does not just "choose you a house she chooses you a new lifestyle". What !! Apparently Rosie has the powers of some form of God. This is clearly where all these estate agents are going wrong. They are just showing people houses. No consideration is going in to the lifestyle that people want. Regular readers will know Mickey is moving house. Have you asked that nice bloke from the estate agent to find you a new lifestyle as well Mickey ?Clearly be careful that you are not asking them to be your pimp though. The more I watch this the more I am amazed. It appears Rosie is not even an estate agent - she just introduces celebrities to estate agents !! This is money for old rope. I am fascinated. I just hope Sarah Beeny is watching and copies this idea - I do not understand why Brian Deane did not go to her in the first place.

Annoying children

2007-04-16T20:57:00.000Z

Davie's right about that kid on Property Ladder on Wednesday. She had something to say about everything. Everything that came out of her mouth was naive, unoriginal and unfunny (says me), and yet her parents acted as though she was a cross between Gandhi and Oscar Wilde. I'll bet she doesn't go to school and is taught at home by said parents. Yes, I know she's only thirteen but she had that sort of completely misguided confident attitude about her which made me think that she's never been among children of her own age. No-one has told her (in a cruel and sadistic way) that she's annoying and that her opinion doesn't matter.

Do you remember that advert for Dairylea where these awful stage school kids sang a song about how much they liked Dairylea while running about in fields? I really hated it. "I like the taste of butter!" sang one. "I like the taste of cheese!" sang another one. "I like the taste of milk!" sang an even other one. "They're all in Dairylea!" cried the happy farmer. My tummy says it's time for tea. So let's down tools for Dairylea! There's enough for me, and me, and me!!!! A taste of the country. (Once again at this stage I point out that I might have got the words dreadfully wrong but I can't be bothered to do any checking. Heroes is on soon! I haven't got time.) And all the kids grinned and nodded furiously whenever the camera was on them. It was like Emu's Pink Windmill Show except without the pathetic dragon.

And then there was that obnoxious girl who was five or something who got her O-levels. She was homeschooled. Ruth someone or other. Went to Oxford at seven or something. Didn't have the humility and shyness that being at school grinds into you. Just looked her up on google using the keywords "ruth", "oxford" and "teenager", and it was first hit. Brilliant. Still she seems to be doing all right for herself now. Married with a couple of kids. Fair play to her. Well done. (Not very difficult though when you're a female mathematician. For every one female mathematician there are five hundred male ones, of which ten can actually hold a conversation with a female, so she was never going to struggle.)

I really haven't got anything to say today have I? If I'd thought about it, I'm sure I could have made this a bit more coherent. But Heroes is about to start and I meant to write this much earlier but my internet was down. Quick Mickey, write down what you watched on telly last night with comments when the mood takes you!

My viewing yesterday:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart (I'm up to date - they had an Easter break which allowed me to catch up).
Have I Got News For You
Cricket World Cup
Ruddy Hell It's Harry and Paul or whatever it's called (I actually found this funny and laughed a number of times (I really wanted to not like it). However I have a feeling that every week is going to be the same characters doing the same things over and over again, within a couple of episodes it'll be catchphrase after catchphrase appealing to the playground masses. It's lazy, LAZY!)
Doctor Who (Like an immensely sad no-life thirty-six year old I've been waiting for over a year to find out what the Face of Bo was going to tell the Doctor, after it was "trailed" in the first episode of the previous series. I love that kind of prophetic rubbish when it's done properly on a telly show. I'm really looking forward to the rest of the series now.)

Right, I'm now going to watch Heroes. And then I shall watch Prison Break. And then I shall go to bed. And then I shall go to sleep. And then I shall get up. And then I shall go to work.

Wow

2007-04-15T19:19:00.000Z

Apologies to readers of the world's best loved TV blog for the lack of activity in the past week. Mickey and I have had a long hard look at ourselves, told ourselves some home truths and promised to be more diligent in the coming week. Well since I last wrote I had an excellent Wednesday night. Not only is it now Apprentice night, but Channel 4 have served up Property Ladder in the 8pm slot. This week Apprentice night was at Mickeys. I went expecting to have to order pizza but Mickey surprised us all with a great feast of burgers, beans and chips. This is one of my favourite dinners and when combined with Sarah Beeny I was a happy man. Sarah is excellent. Regular readers will know Mickey is currently single and I really think he should make a play for Beeny. She is very attractive and always seems to be right. I think they would make a perfect couple. Sarah if you are reading this, I know you have family but if you fancy a bit on the side my friend cooks a great burger.

This week Sarah met two families looking to make some money. A mother and son who had bought a house to renovate in order to earn money to send the kid to university. All very admirable. The kid was of course lazy and could not really be bothered to put in any effort. Why would he, after all his mother had just staked all her life savings on the project. He seemed to get a bit interested when Sarah bought him some work boots (ah isn't she lovely) but soon slipped back into his slovenly ways. Of course they made a 40k profit and he has probably since decided he does not need to go to Uni as he can make more money watching his mother do up properties. The other family - I cannot bring myself to even talk about them. 2 kids, one of whom, the 13 year old daughter made us all very angry. Suffice to say they ignored Sarah's advice and listened to the 13 year girl and her terrible ideas. This 13 year old even used the term wow factor, which is becoming dangerously overused by this society. In the end they made a huge profit. More money than they could possibly handle given their collective IQ. The 13 year old sat there with a look of "told you so" written all over her face. Sarah just smiled, probably safe in the knowledge that they will take on another project and lose it all. Either that or she was thinking of burger and chips at Mickeys next Wednesday.

Happy Easter Everybody!!

2007-04-08T19:55:00.000Z

I've been a little quiet as I haven't been watching much television this week. After watching 24 at Davie's followed by The Apprentice at Mr & Mrs T's, I've had a couple of days where I watched no television. I've been out socialising. Don't worry, ladies. I didn't meet anyone so you're all still in with a chance.

So, with little television under my belt, I'll just mention what I'm really looking forward to this week.

What I'm really looking forward to this week is Life On Mars on Tuesday. If you haven't watched it before, don't bother as it's the last ever episode. I really like Life On Mars. I probably shouldn't, as really all it is is a cop show set in the seventies with a character from the modern day.

The episodes generally follow the same line. There's a crime. The seventies cops decide who done it based on prejudice and intimidation. Sam Tyler thinks there's more to it so looks closely using modern techniques. There're a couple of arguments but Sam persuades the seventies cops. They solve the crime, and it tends to be a person who didn't look as though they'd done it at the start of the episode.

Throughout it all, something is happening to Sam in modern times which affects the way he deals with the case. Every episode has a few will they won't they scenes with Maggie (the girl cop from the seventies), and Sam will always accidentally mention a modern day thing which the seventies cops think is silly. And maybe someone will mention spangles or Mott the Hoople at some point.

Every episode, same formula. I like it though. They haven't made enough episodes for it to be boring.

I'm excited about this week's episode as I'm hoping that it explains it all. I say hoping as I had a really vivid dream the other night that I saw the last episode and it just ended without explaining anything. It was like watching the last episodes of Twin Peaks, Sapphire and Steel and Farscape (before the mini-series finale had been announced) all at the same time. I woke up by jumping up from my bed, drenched in sweat shouting "NO!" (like people do on the telly). Then I realised that it was all a dream, that I'd actually spent the night dreaming about the last ever episode of Life On Mars, that I was a thirty-six year old man whose life was so barren and devoid of interests or hobbies that the most vivid dream I've had in the last six months was about a formulaic television programme. And now I'm writing about it on the internet.

Special Easter Day edition of Mickey's television viewing last night:

Please pretend that the bullet points are easter eggs. I could probably find a way of doing this, but I really can't be bothered.

Cricket World Cup (Bangladesh beat South Africa. That's good for England, apparently.)
Harry Hill's TV Burp (In a similar way to Little Britain and Catherine Tate, he makes the same jokes over and over again. But he's much funnier and he looks a bit like friend of Mickey and Davie's TV Rant, Mr T.)
Entourage (Last episode of the series, recorded about two months ago. I've finally got round to watching it. It's supposed to be funny, but I barely raise a smile when I watch it. And yet, watch it I will.)
Battlestar Galactica (A filler episode but still infinitely better than the best episode of Enterprise).

And as it's Easter Sunday, this means there won't be another Creme Egg advert on for another nine months. A little message to Cadbury: how about a new advertising slogan in 2008? My suggestion: Cadbury Creme Eggs, how many can YOU get in your mouth at the same time!?

The good doctor

2007-04-04T18:30:00.000Z

Readers of Britain's favourite blog will be pleased to know Mickey is safely sat on my sofa watching Sunday's 24 whilst I type this. I have left the adverts on but he is just fast forwarding through them so there is peace in the room. Which is more than can be said for the control room at CTU where Jack and LLF (Little Lord Fauntelroy) are about to attack a house.

I see that you mate Tennant is back as the good doctor. Is this his second or third year ? I think it will be his last. I am no expert on the doctor who series. I hated it as a kid. I used to hide behind the sofa when I was at my Nana's. She would then make my uncle switch it off. As a consequence he holds a grudge against me that will never die. But that seems to be the way with "Whoeys" as I like to call them. They are irrational. They fell in love with a series that was ridiculous. The props were cheap, the acting poor and you could drive a bus through the storylines. Yet it was incredibly popular. But why - the main character is obnoxious and does not even have a weapon. Luke Syywalker had his light sabre, Captain Kirk had his phaser. What did the Doctor have - a scarf and a metal dog which had the turning cycle of the Titanic and did not have a mouth so it could not bite anyone anyway.

I like Tennant and think he has to be the best they have had but he is too media savvy to stay with this show. So it looks like the doctor will have to regenerate again. But who will replace him Mickey. My money is on your mate Jimmy Nesbitt or Nick Berry.

The Doctor

2007-04-03T21:28:00.000Z

Welcome home, Davie. I was beginning to struggle holding Britain's favourite North-East based television blog written by people called Mickey and Davie together for a couple of days there. I don't know whether you noticed, but I almost lost my ability to make witty and inciteful comments about the state of the British television industry and just went on about how much certain adverts annoy me.

I am actually quite angry tonight, as my old faithful computer is finally reaching the end of its life. I'm a very impatient man, and when I click to start my internet, I expect it to set up immediately. A delay of longer than five seconds is unacceptable to me, and "Mickey's PC" (as I like to call it) is now taking over thirty seconds from click to homepage. It's almost as annoying as having to listen to someone whistling in a supermarket. (You're in a supermarket! There are people around! They can hear you. Do you think they want to listen to your idiotic twittering?? Do you think they hear it and say ooh how charming, some music! Let's tarry awhiles and listen to the sweet sounds emerging from that musical gentleman's pursed lips. Do you really think that?? How about I go around shouting a System of a Down song at the top of my voice right in your ear while you're having a picnic with your family?? Would you like that?? Because it's the same thing. Exactly the same thing!)

But this has nothing to do with television. So I'd best mention the return of my all-time favourite television show this week. I am of course talking about (and here I unsuccessfully try to think of an amusingly bad television programme that returned this week before just telling the truth with) Doctor Who, or, as I used to call it when I was two, "Doggaddoggooah."

Ever since I've known television I've loved Doggaddoggooah. It must have been back in the Jon Pertwee days that I started watching it. Even though I could barely speak, every Saturday night I would yell for my parents to put it on. Doggaddoggooah and I fell out for a season or two during the dark times when Colin Baker and worst-assistant-ever, Bonnie Langford took over. (I must have been about fifteen. Bonnie Langford!! Was it Michael Grade's fault? What on earth was he thinking? Bonnie Langford is so annoying that she'd make me stop watching Doctor Who - there can be nothing more annoying by definition! Now he's at ITV is he going to fiddle with Primevel and replace Hannah from S Club with Carol Vorderman?)

So, it started well. I like the new assistant, Martha Jones, and I was exceptionally pleased to see that her brother is played by that Reggie Yates off of Top Of The Pops.

Mind you, I didn't appreciate the kiss. That sort of thing might be all well and good and expected in fairly poor spinoff Torchwood, with its adult themes and random swearing at inappropriate moments, but Doggaggoggooah doesn't kiss! Especially not on the lips. And he'd only just met her. At least when Doggaddoggooah kissed Billie, I mean Rose, at the end of "season one" (or "season twenty-eight" as I like to call it (if I'm counting the TV Movie as a season, which I shouldn't)) she'd known him for a bit, but even then I disapproved. It's like they're trying to make Doggaddoggooah sexy or twenty-first century, to give a will they won't they Moonlighting type theme running through it. Could you see Patrick Troughton or William Hartnell having a snog with their assistants? It's not on. No more of that sort of nonsense, say I!

Once again I'm well past my two hundred words, I didn't make half of the points I was going to about Doggaddoggooah and I haven't even started my hilarious review of last night's viewing which tonight I'm going to call "Mickey's viewing for the Monday night just gone".

Mickey's viewing for the Monday night just gone:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart (I record it every night but don't watch it every night. It's a moderate worry to me.)
Children of Men (Virgin Media have a special offer on. It cost a penny to watch it, so I "spent a penny". I really enjoyed it. It's not like I thought it was going to be. Really grim, but strangely familiar. And it was set in the future which made it sci-fi. And I like sci-fi.)
Heroes (Hmm, beginning to slow down, not as good as the first few. It's fallen off the pace a bit. I still love it, but it's going through a bit of a Lost mid-season lull (It just took ten seconds for my PC to register that I'd typed lull there. It's really getting to me. I'd buy a new one, but I'm trying to move house. I want to save a bit of cash! TRY LIVING MY LIFE!))
Prison Break (Predictable. I could have told you what was going to happen before the episode started.)
Born Survivor: Bear Grylls (or is it Bear Grylls: Born Survivor? He ate a raw sea urchin, poisoned some fish and hurt his privates while climbing down a tree.)

Apprentice tomorrow, and first Apprentice night of the year at Mr & Mrs T's tomorrow night! As a special bonus, Davie and Mrs Davie have agreed to let me watch this week's 24 beforehand! You know, life's not that bad, after all.

When in Rome

2007-04-02T18:05:00.000Z

Mickey. Hey I am back. Thanks from all our readers for holding the fort whilst I took Mrs Davie to Rome. I am back now and can categorically state that British tv is better than Italian TV. Apart from the football they only appear to have some games shows that make the ITV2 programmes look like intellectual documentaries.

Since I got back I have naturally been catching up on what I have missed

24 - brilliant. I am very excited that Little Lord Fauntelroy has now joined the show. I like this for 2 reasons. One I like his acting style. 2 It confirms that I am not losing my mind as at first I feared. I have been telling the Ginger Prince about LLF appearing for weeks and was starting to doubt myself.

The Apprentice - I would like to retract my statement about the quantum physicist woman winning. She has about as much chance as the amateur Machivellian who has already felt the sharp end of Sugar's tongue. Naomi will win. That is if she is not too busy getting frisky with the male candidates.

The Bill - DS Hunter was in which is always good. I am surprised he is only a DS - I think he is ready for promotion as he is showing a more mature attitude nowadays.

To finish I thought I would give our readers a bit of cultural chat. Rome is great and you should go. When in Rome you have to visit the Sistine chapel as it would be a shame to go all that way and not visit it. But be prepared - it is rubbish. No wonder Michelangelo took so long over it - it is too busy. He should have kept it simple. Raphael would have.

So much more to watch though.

V+ Box

2007-03-28T19:38:00.000Z

I've just received a text message from Davie. He's unable to get to an internet cafe, and is very annoyed about it as he wanted to write a post setting out some things about my V+ box. I shall therefore help him out.

Things I like about my V+ box are as follows:

I can record two things and watch a third at the same time. I can even pause live tv on the third programme while it's still recording! When I have my separate terrestrial HDD working, this means I can record three things and watch a fourth. This is very good. So a few weeks ago when there was a clash between Heroes, Prison Break, Charlie Brookers Screen Wipe and Nip Tuck, I was able to watch them all.

It has that whole TV On Demand thing. Especially the Catch Up TV. This is very good. Last night I recorded Life On Mars, but the recording failed midway through. I just went through a couple of menus on my V+ box, and before too long I was able to watch a direct feed from Virgin. Brilliant.

Things I don't like about my V+ box are as follows:

It doesn't show Sky One.

It sometimes goes wrong. A few months ago it lost all the details of everything I'd recorded. The programmes were still there, but absolutely no information about them. I just had a list of fifty programmes all called "Recovered content". It happened late one evening - that night I couldn't sleep with worry, and I was furious for days afterwards (until I went through them all and did a list of what they were).

(By the way, ladies. I'm still single.)

It sometimes goes wrong. There was that time when it didn't record Daybreak last week. And then there was yesterday when Life On Mars went wrong in the middle of the programme.

Between midnight and one o'clock, it goes all slow and temperamental. Channel changes take minutes to process. I'm fast forwarding through adverts on a recorded programme and the "play" button doesn't respond, so I'm suddenly hurtling through the rest of the programme at 32x speed and I'm seeing what happens really quickly before I can even look away and it's spoiling the programme for me. I think it might be because of it processing the programmes for the new day that's appeared on the listings guide. But why do it at midnight, when I'm still watching my sad sci-fi based serial shows? It makes me annoyed which means I can't sleep. Which means I feel bad the next day. Which makes me angry.

It doesn't have a button which automatically mutes the television whenever that AA advert comes on when all the AA men come out and sing "You've Got A Friend", implying that the service they provide to AA members is out of friendship rather than the annual fee. Especially the bloke who starts and ends the song. Singing it like he really means it. Singing the last "friend" with a Carey-esque warble worthy of an X Factor wannabe. Either sing the tune or get lost! I hate people. Winter Spring Summer or Fall, All you have to do is call? What's Fall? Are we suddenly in America? And there's the bearded bloke with the snow. He's bad as well.

Ah yes, Mickey, you can always fall back on writing about how much adverts annoy you when the post seems to be going nowhere.

Let me answer now the following question: "What television did you watch last night, Mickey?"

Wainwright's Walks (Julia Bradbury doing Scafell Pike. I did it on my second attempt. The first time I didn't get halfway. My lack of fitness and general allround punyness meant that I was in agony just climbing over a couple of stiles.)
Life on Mars (the recording stopped in the middle of the programme, but it was okay as I watched the rest "On Demand").
Kidnapped (US show about a kid being kidnapped. It's okay, but Channel 4 are showing double episodes, and it's a real pain to watch so much drama.)
The Daily Show With Jon Stewart (More4 appears to have the same sound issues as SciFi channel. Intensely annoying. I should have mentioned it in my list above. But it was going on too long anyway. Aren't blogs supposed to be a maximum of 200 words or something?)

Finally, GP, a close friend of Mickey and Davie's TV Rant, has a tip for winner of this series of the Apprentice. Based purely on appearance of course, the predicted winner is this time coloured a vibrant red. Stay tuned to future instalments of Mickey and Davie's TV Rant to find out who out of the three of us will win the special prize of a tile showing a chimpanzee on the toilet eating a banana.*

* This is a lie. The tile belongs to me. I'm not giving it away no matter who wins.

I'm no fan of the egg

2007-03-27T18:23:00.000Z

Isn't it great that Easter's almost here?

Isn't it, though?

Really, isn't it?

It's great, of course, because we have the annual laugh-a-thon which is the Cadbury Creme Egg advert.

This year, they've done something rather clever. Rather than make a new set of adverts, they've just used the adverts from last year. I found last year's adverts so funny that I would have gone straight round to Cadbury HQ and punched their Marketing Director in the face (seriously, right in the face) had they not allowed me a few more chances to enjoy the hilarity of the great British eccentric singing a song about how they love their Cadbury Creme Egg to the tune of a popped up My Way.

I remember a few years ago when they stopped the "How Do You Eat Yours?" style of advert (which involved, as I recall, someone doing a hugely accomplished Austin Powers impression while explaining how they enjoyed eating two creme eggs rather than the traditional one), I got in my car, drove to Bournville, and found the Marketing Director. I was about to punch him in the face (seriously, right in the face) when he distracted me by showing the new advert.

"Eeh, look at the woman, with a judge's wig on, eeh, she's not a judge after all, she's a cleaner and she's eating a creme egg in a specific way!" I squealed with delight. "And she and her friend are singing about it!"

"And look, a jolly lumberjack or something. Maybe he's chopping his creme egg in half with his axe, and perhaps giving half to his wife, I can't remember!" I yelped. "And he's singing about his enjoyment of the creme egg also. And it's all to the tune of My Way, except all popped up!!"

Oh yes, how happy I am when I watch that advert. I enjoy watching the many many different ways people eat creme eggs. Whether they're eating it by having the chocolate first, the fondant first or a mixture of the two, each way is so very different to the other.

Because after all, that is exactly what is unique about the creme egg. It is its defining characteristic, the ability to eat it in many many different ways. Why else would you buy a creme egg? For the chocolate? Don't be stupid. For the sweet fondant centre? You're a fool. Because it is the confectionary item that one can be most versatile with in the method of its consumption? Damn right!

Do you know what they should do? Do you? They should release the Cadbury Creme Egg song (the popped up version of My Way with the creme egg related lyric) as a single. In the same way that Dancin' In The Moonlight enjoyed success following Jamie Oliver's hungover advert, perhaps this amusing song celebrating the creme egg would be Top of the Pops. After all, it's such a great song that Cadbury thought that I would enjoy it being blared into my living room every commercial break, I can't see why they wouldn't think it will do well in the hit parade.

Last night, while I was watching the television, the following programmes were on:

The Gadget Show (I'm trying to move. I'm not sure about my budget going forward. I'm not going to buy a gadget for a number of months. I don't enjoy the banter between the presenters. Their reviews are poor. I keep falling asleep during the programme. I managed to stop watching Castaway, so why do I persist with this rubbish?)
The Daily Show With Jon Stewart
The Trap: What Happened To Our Dreams Of Freedom (From Sunday. Yes, that's right. A thought-provoking documentary. I don't just watch cricket, sad sci-fi, "worthy" comedy and reality television. I have hidden depths.)
Heroes (Made slightly annoying as the sound kept cutting out for fractions of seconds throughout. Like my life isn't bad enough already.)
Prison Break (It was good.)

Mickey and Davie's TV Rant regulars will notice that Davie hasn't posted for a few days. That's because he's away in Rome for the week with Mrs Davie. I'm sure that at this very minute he's making his way to an internet cafe to post some insightful comments about the state of Italian television. In the meantime, the light-green one is Davie's tip (based purely on appearance remember) for the winner of the Apprentice.

Spoilage

2007-03-22T18:16:00.000Z

Davie. I've recorded that ONE Life thing about Alex (BB3) and Mel (BB1)'s dog on your recommendation but haven't watched it yet. Don't spoil it for me!!!

In recent times I've become a little obsessed with avoiding so-called spoilers on television shows. For some, it's impossible.

Doctor Who, for example, seems to be headline news. Everyone knew that the bloke who plays Nicky in Our Friends In The North was going to be replaced by the bloke who plays Barty Crouch Jr in that Harry Potter film, because it was reported as a proper news story. I've come to the unhappy conclusion that as far as Doctor Who is concerned, I will never feel the utter excitement and surprise as I felt as a ten year old when the bloke who does the voiceover in Little Britain was replaced by the bloke who plays Tristan Farnon in All Creatures Great and Small.

One of the many reasons I stopped watching EastEnders was that I knew the major plots weeks in advance. Nothing ever surprised. I knew that the bloke off of Spandau Ballet was going to die. I knew that the bloke off of Ross Kemp on Gangs was going to do whatever he did on that particular episode when he left. There was never any drama in it as it was all announced on the front of every magazine weeks beforehand.

A few years ago I stopped looking at US tv websites, as they'd always give something away (particularly bad for Lost and 24 in recent years), but more recently I've become more paranoid about being told plots by tv listings. I think the most angry I've ever been (in my life) is when I was innocently reading the Radio Times and in a very small aside about that lass who was in Fatal Attraction and Dangerous Liaisons it gave away the end of the then forthcoming series of the Shield (possibly the second best programme on television ever).

I was spitting at the page. Seriously. I was literally spitting. But it wasn't my Radio Times, so that was all right.

So, what point was I making? I long for a more innocent time, when the news was real news and not about television? I long for a time when I didn't read listings magazines? I wish I was a hermit whose only contact with the outside world was by watching television programmes? Really, this is dreadful. I'm very sorry.

What's worse is that I seem to remember now that they announced that Peter Davison, I mean the bloke who played Campion in Campion, was going to be the new Doctor Who before it happened on Blue Peter, so this whole thing is just rubbish. And I made it up about spitting.

Television last night? What was it that was watched by me? Here, my friend. Let me tell you:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart
Battlestar Galactica (Oh yes! I may not have Sky One, but my brother does. Magnificent stuff. A really seriously brilliant programme.)
Castaway (It was the programme from the Sunday before last. I watched three minutes of it, then decided that I was being stupid. So I turned it off and deleted it from my V+ box. I say no to Castaway.)
Grand Designs
Daybreak (From last week. Except it hadn't recorded properly on my V+ box so I didn't actually watch this).
Born Survivor: Bear Grylls (In which Bear Grylls gave me some useful tips for surviving in the event of me being lost in the Florida Everglades with nothing but a flint, a knife and a camera crew.)
Entourage (This is from weeks ago. It's an HBO comedy that should be on something like More4, but it's shown on ITV2 and is sponsored by Britney Spears' perfume.)
The Office: An American Workplace (Also from weeks ago.)

The Apprentice starts next week. Davie and I have decided who we think will win before it starts. My tip, based purely on appearance, I have coloured in blue.

Take the law into your hands

2007-03-21T19:28:00.000Z

Michael. Come on now. The young lads who took your number plates are probably just having a laugh. They were probably bored because the youth centre was shut due to staff cut backs or something. They probably were going to return the plates but found you had moved the car. Incidentally Michael it is illegal to drive without your plates.

I thought you had moved from writing the world's favourite blog to writing TV series for ITV this week. I watched their latest drama offering, Mobile last night which was actually quite good. The basic premise seemed to be there was a bloke who was dying because he had a brain tumour from working as a telephone engineer. The tumour was caused by using a mobile excessively. He therefore decided to kill people using a mobile and spray painting the message that "mobiles are the instruments of the devil". It had lots of random violence with people who were too loud on their phone meeting a swift and decisive end. It was good and is perhaps a sign that Mickey's law could work in this country. I was convinced you had written it. Maybe with GP's help as he is no fan of the mobile. I will definitely tune in again. You should too Michael.

Last night I also watched a programme about Alex from Big Brother 3 in a custody battle with Melanie from Big Brother 1 over their dog. It was a brilliant programme and only served to confirm that Alex should be on national TV every day. I am thinking of writing to Simon Cowell to tell him that I found the replacement for Louis Walsh.

The British Sketch Show

2007-03-20T17:47:00.000Z

Here is my thing on why I think the British Sketch Show is not very good anymore.

I submit to you that every new sketch show produced in the last three years has just been a mindless collection of catchphrases and characters repeated episode after episode. And what is more, I proclaim that these sketch shows are unfunny! Yes. I do.

Take Catherine Tate, for example. As well as the hilarious Lauren who asks the straight person in each sketch an amusing question over and over again, we have the hysterical bald fellow who exhibits indignation when the straight person in each sketch assumes that he's gay, we have the grandmother who swears (and may have a catchphrase, I don't know, I can't remember, I haven't watched the show enough, yes, I know I haven't thought this through very well, I'm very sorry), the woman who is looking for a husband with sidesplitting consequences each week, and there's probably someone who works in an office or something.

Then there's Little Britain. The format of the sketches are so formulaic they write themselves. Put a character in a situation, say the stock catchphrases, job done. Lou and Andy are a bit different in that they have two sketch formats. Lou and Andy go somewhere. While Lou isn't looking, Andy gets out of his wheelchair and does something active. Or Andy wants something slightly strange, then once he's got it decides he doesn't want it. (E.g. Andy decides that life crippled in a wheelchair is too much for him and he asks Lou to assist him with his suicide. Lou reluctantly agrees, firstly asking "Are you sure you want to do this? Remember you said that euthanasia was the start of a slippery slope that made a mockery of the sanctity of human life?" Andy responds "I know," or something. They go ahead with it. Just after the lethal injection has been administered, and there's no going back, Andy says "What are we doing tomorrow?" or something.)

And all new sketch shows follow the same format. Tittybangbang, Man Stroke Woman, there was one on Channel 4 which was like Man Stroke Woman but I can't remember the name, I think Charlie Brooker wrote a couple of sketches in it, just a minute I'll look it up... Spoons, that's what it was called, and yes, Charlie Brooker wrote some sketches for it. Start off promising, some original sketches, then next episode, exactly the same. Mitchell & Webb, while having proper sketches, ruined it all by repeating the one joke sketch, Numberwang, over and over again, and inflicting those awful dull snooker commentators on us. Whenever the snooker commentators appeared it gave me the same feeling of sickening disappointment as I used to get when Smith and Jones did their head-to-heads, or when Ronnie Corbett came on to give his monologue. I tried to laugh, I really did. But deep down I knew I was in for three or four minutes of slow and tedious unfunny comedy.

So, my point is this. Stop pandering to schoolchildren with this "familiar characters in amusing situations" nonsense. It's lazy. Write enough material for six half hour sketch shows rather than just repeat half an hour's worth of sketches six times. Be more like Fry and Laurie and Big Train. Oh, and stop doing Christmas Specials. I hate Christmas and everything to do with it. Especially the music. Especially "So Here It Is, Merry Christmas" by Slade. Especially the bit where Noddy Holder shouts "It's Christmas!"

And that is my thing on why I think the British Sketch Show is not very good anymore.

What television night:

The Gadget Show (I don't watch it for the gadgets, it's the will they/won't they sexual chemistry between Jason Bradbury, Suzi Perry and John Bentley).
The Daily Show With Jon Stewart
More cricket
Heroes
Prison Break

I shall take this opportunity to go all Richard Madeley on whoever stole the number plates from my car on Sunday night. As I type this, I'm furiously shaking my fist at the screen. Be warned. I shall shake my fist even more furiously when I get bogus speeding tickets.

How was it made ?

2007-03-19T19:05:00.000Z

Mickey. I have indeed calmed down following "busgate". It was Sunday yesterday. A good day Sunday. My favourite programme 24 and another favourite (probably in top 10) Lost. Yesterday to spice things up a bit I decided to watch the re-run of the final of MGL. You have raved about this programme for weeks now. All in all Michael it was a bit of a disappointment. I wanted to know what they were cooking but also how do they cook it. It is no use just presenting me with here are the ingredients and then cut to Frankie and Benny eating it. I want to know how it was put together. Your mate, Jamie Oliver for instance shot to fame because he showed people how to make good simple, honest food. You saw him out and about buying the ingredients. Often he went out on his bike/scooter. I like bikes and scooters.Then he prepared them explaining to the mystery woman behind the camera what he was doing. I think she was either a bit retarded or had never been near a kitchen before ("Why are you cooking the chicken Jamie" "Because sweetheart, raw chicken will make you sick"). You get the idea. Then he has his mates round and they have a good time eating it. Great TV. I may just record ER and Prison Break and watch re-runs of the Naked Chef and UK Food +1.

Goodbye John and Gregg

2007-03-17T16:46:00.000Z

Davie. Take a couple of days off and calm yourself down! A bus was late, that's all. It's not as if anyone's taken Battlestar Galactica, 24 and Lost away from you. Get things in context! All that happened was you spent an extra quarter of an hour waiting in a bus stop on a pleasantly mild mid-March evening. It's not as if HBOS have brought out a new advert involving four blokes singing how they give a little extra to the tune of Take That's Patience.

Perhaps Davie's anger really stems from the fact that "Trend Analyst" Steven won MGL. All the way he barely scraped his way to each next round. Each time he knocked out someone who seemed just as deserving, or more deserving than him. None more so than when he got through to the final by knocking out poor old David.

Still, John and Gregg seemed to like him. And "Cheese Shop Owner" Ben had self-destructed by making an orange tart with olives and fennel. And "Country Lawyer" Hannah had served up raw lamb. So I don't suppose they had a choice really.

I'm really going to miss MGL. I'll have to find something else to watch while I eat my tea. Maybe Kill It, Cook It Eat It (or KICIEI as I may start calling it).

I know you're not interested, but here it is anyway:

Cricket World Cup (England vs New Zealand. England lost. It was an awful performance. How about, for a change, Kevin "KP" Pietersen actually finishing a job? And how about Andrew "Freddie" Flintoff having a word with himself and working out why on earth he's been unable to bat for the last eighteen months? It is the World Cup after all.)
Comic Relief (Featuring the hilarious Catherine Tate. In one sketch things changed around slightly as Tony Blair said the funneee catchphrase instead of the hilarious Catherine Tate. Everytime anyone says that funneee catchphrase, I literally wet myself. Not from laughter though. I wet myself through utter despair. Comic Relief's a good cause though. Right Davie?)

Another Friday night spent alone watching the television, followed by a Saturday afternoon writing about it on the internet. I really am pathetic.

Well done Stagecoach

2007-03-15T19:28:00.000Z

Today I am not going to write about TV. Today I am taking a break. It is not even my turn to contribute to Britains most loved blog. I simply want to say congratulations to Brian Souter, the current Chief Exec of Britain's beloved bus company Stagecoach. Well done Brian. You gave decided not to appoint an Operations Director to the main board. Well done. You don't need people like that with their crazy ideas about bus timetables, efficiencies and levels of service. They get in the way. They are red tape. How is a forward thinking group like yours supposed to make a profit when they are hamstrung by mindless idiots insisting on things like that. Much better to leave things to chance. If a bus turns up then great - the paying customer can get on and travel to a destination of their choice. If the bus does not turn up, hey not to worry the paying customer can wait in the cold until one of your employees can be arsed to turn up. It's your liberal thinking that will encourage people to ignore the public transport system and continue to use their cars. In 2050 when half of the UK is underwater you can turn round, pat yourself on the back and say to yourself "I did that".

Stupid Designs

2007-03-15T18:50:00.000Z

Davie, what have you got against Limahl? Did Kajagoogoo's "Too Shy" prevent Spandau Ballet's classic Instinction from getting to number one? Of course, the problem with your C list Celebrity Island would be that your hero, Tony Hadley, would get himself on it. And then you'd have no choice but to watch the twenty-four hour live feed on ITV2.

Having watched Grand Designs last night, I am seeing a common theme. These people building their new homes are made out to be visionaries, courageous souls who will stop at nothing to see their dream fulfilled, noble and single-minded, self-sacrificing and heroic.

But they're not. They're selfish idiots, gambling their lives and their children's welfare over a whim, or some stupid drunken idea they've had.

A couple of weeks ago, we had the obsessed architect who almost destroyed his children's inheritance because he wanted to live in a castle. Last week, there was the bloke with the mullet who'd not even insured his house despite having a baby on the way, and then made things worse by calling his little girl Beaver. Beaver!! Seriously, she needs to be schooled at home, she won't survive a day at a comprehensive with a name like that.

Then this week we had Green Billy with his recycled houseboat, made out of scrap. At least the other two had money to burn. Green Billy had no money and two children! Didn't he feel some responsibility? Perhaps having children makes you more reckless, makes you take unnecessary and stupid stupid risks. Maybe it makes you want to trust in fate to just let everything land on your lap.

Surely any sane man would have been crippled with an overwhelming feeling of utter horror at the monstrosity that he was wasting all of his money on. He didn't even have anywhere to put it! How could he show his face on television? How can he get up in the morning? What is going on in his head? Where is his shame?? He has two children. Two children!

At the end of the show, Kevin McCloud did the right thing and brought in social services who took the children away from him. The last scene showed Green Billy wandering naked and confused around a scrapyard muttering to himself about finding a recycled wind turbine.

Television shows I watched last night:

MGL x 2 (Aspiring Michelin Star chef, Ben looks to be out of the running now. Unless he pulls something pretty special off tonight, I'd say flamboyant chef, Steven or experimental chef, Hannah will win it.)
Grand Designs
Daybreak (The first episode. It's an American sci-fi type show where this bloke keeps experiencing the same day over and over again. You know, like that film.)