24 goes to Africa via Carlyle
24 Redemption, SKY1, 24TH November, 10pm
Thank heavens Fox have finally realized what everyone else concluded several months ago…January is far too long to wait for the new series of 24. Like every other die hard fan I have been doing all I can to pass the time. Whether it’s been debating Tony Almeida’s continued existence despite being injected with a lethal dose of toxins and shot at point blank range, or whether it’s been spending a day listening to the gripping soundtrack on my MP3 and shouting ‘damn it’ continuously (not to mention needlessly) I have done everything there is to do to keep in 24 mode.Even pictures of a drunken Kiefer Sutherland stumbling off his bar stall topless have given me small saviours to cling to.
But now finally 24 is back in the form of a two hour special airing on Sky1. It will certainly be a novel experience only watching two hours of the programme and not spending a day glued to the sofa surviving on ominous crumbs that have slipped through the cushions years ago, but then beggars can not be choosers.
Watching the trailer it seemed very clear from the off that everything was back to normal - The world is screwed, Jack’s on it. What was interesting to note was that while the first ever American female President is being …read more
Friday’s TV: The IT Crowd is Back
With the third series of Graham Linehan’s excellent IT Crowd looming large, OnTheBox.com takes a look at the incestuous circle of modern British comedy (left).
THE IT CROWD, Channel 4, Friday 21 November 10:00pm Alert Me
With a TV schedule that had already seen the likes of the Mighty Boosh and Nathan Barley, the IT Crowd seemed like a natural progression. The show seems like an amalgamation of a lot of the British comedy that had come before it, with the outrageous stereotypes of Nathan Barley, the sphincter-clenchingly awkward workplace interactions of the Office and the silliness of the Mighty Boosh all having been distilled into an eminently watchable and consistently funny sitcom.
Tonight’s third season premiere sees a greater depth of character imparted upon the main players. Richard Ayoade’s gleefully myopic Moss is built up from his utterly socially Read rest of review
Wednesday’s TV: New English Civil War drama- off with its head!
THE DEVIL’S WHORE, Channel 4, Wednesday 19th November, 9:00pm
Gasping young ladies in tight bodices and dashing young gentlemen whose tresses spill onto their frilly collars have long been a staple of British costume dramas. The Devil’s Whore, this autumn’s four-parter from Channel 4, has an abundance of both- but not much else.
The new drama from Peter Flannery (best known for the mid-90s series, Our Friends in the North) follows the fortunes of Angelica Fanshawe, (fictional) niece to Charles I. Set between 1642 and 1660, it charts the progress of the English Civil War through Angelica’s eyes, softening the political and religious complexities of this period with some swash-buckling human interest. (For those of us a bit rusty on our British history, Charles I was the pretty-boy monarch removed from the throne and executed on the order of Oliver Cromwell.)
Seventeen year old Angelica finds herself all mixed up in the ever tricky politics of the period not only via her uncle the king, but also through Edward Sexby, a servant of her husband who has links to the anti-monarchist cause. Damned if she’ll behave with the docility expected of a woman of her rank and sympathetic to those calling for greater civil liberties, the feisty young madam becomes embroiled in the republican struggle.
The focus here is definitely one of a scandal-loving nature, characters and their various relationships (mainly those of Angelica). The trouble with this emphasis is that …Read the rest of review
Wednesday’s TV: The Big Bang Theory- Sixty million years in the making wasn’t long enough
THE BIG BANG THEORY, E4, Wednesday 19th November, 9:00pm Alert me
Nerds unite! The new series of The Big Bang Theory has arrived! Although, I’m not entirely sure how…or why.
The first episode of season two sees sweet but romantically inept Leonard trying to fathom why his blossoming relationship with Penny has gone off the boil. Whilst the others dole out relationship advice (which is just about as sound as that given to Eminem and Kim when they were convinced to give it another shot), Penny confides to Sheldon that her own insecurities are stopping her moving forward with Leonard. Sworn to secrecy on the matter by Penny, Sheldon endeavours to keep his mouth shut without developing a nervous tick- cue “hilarious nerdy antics.”
The second season of the Big Bang Theory offers more of the same as the first, only a little bit worse. The excitement of a new comedy series has gone and yet all the characters appear to be in pretty much the same situation they were in at the beginning of the last series. Added to this, there’s only so many times you can hear …Read rest of review
Monday’s TV: A disappointing experiment
CLONE, BBC3, Monday 17th November, 8:30pm Alert me
How science has moved on. When Frankenstein went wrong he looked like a botched flat pack wardrobe with nuts and bolts hanging from his neck and a head obviously constructed with only a quick glance at the instruction manual. This latest failed attempt at a human clone certainly appears to be far more successful, but actually struggles to get the audience on his side.
Dr Victor Blenkinsop (Jonathan Price) has devoted his life to creating the first ever human clone and whilst many would see this as a more than successful innings, the creation, intended to be the prototype super solider made to replace the volunteer army, is something of a failure. Instead Blenkinsop finds himself …Read rest of review
Monday’s TV: The Ascent of Money
For a skint numerophobe like me, a program which is ostensibly about money was not something I was looking forward to. However, I girded my loins, drank a strong cup of coffee and sat down to the Ascent of Money, Channel 4’s inspection of the rise of the money markets and how they have been brought to the brink of collapse.
I needn’t have worried. Niall Ferguson, backed up by his impressive credentials as both a specialist in economic history at Harvard, presents the Ascent of Money with remarkable sensitivity to the average Joe’s obliviousness to the inner workings of finance. Rather than becoming mired down in the technicalities and seemingly unending jargon of the bankers and money men, he attempts to make money something we can relate to more substantially than the familiar sinking feeling of dread when a bank statement hits our welcome mat. In this first episode Ferguson covers 500 years of financial history, showing how money, and money lending in particular, has been the backbone …Read rest of review
10 reasons to make Steven Seagal: The Motion Picture
In a battle between Jean Claude Van Damme and Steven Seagal, resident OTB critic Rob Pearson says not only would Seagal beat le frenchie, but he would blow smoke in his face, run off with his girl, steal his grandma’s cookies and make Mama Van Damme love him more. Let Rob tell you why….
Jean Claude Van Damme, mired in the career-suffocating spiral of straight-to-DVD action spectaculars, recently escaped his low budget prison for just enough time to make JCVD. In this self-reflective film, Van Damme pores over the detritus of his somewhat improbable life and career as a square-jawed, 48 year old, Belgian action hero. By all accounts, it is a good film, but there is one jarring moment as Van Damme is shocked to learn that Steven Seagal has beaten him to a role.
Shocked?! Newsflash, Jean-Claude!
Seagal would kick your ass 8 days a week, while chewing bubblegum, taking your ludicrously twin-double-barrelled name, wearing sunglasses at night - and all while carrying the equivalent of Kate Moss in excess body fat. That’s how much disdain Seagal shows for you, Van Damme – he doesn’t even have to be able to see his toes. So without further ado, here are some reasons to make the movie ‘SS: The Living American Dream Action Hero Legend’ (title subject to change).
1. Under Siege
Undoubtedly Seagal’s peak, as he plays the Navy SEAL-turned-cook, Casey Ryback. Alright, so it’s ever so slightly derivative (Die Hard on a boat, anyone?) - Under Siege remains compellingly entertaining viewing. Plus, his sidekick is Miss July 1989 – and within 30 minutes he’s turned her from a gun-hating liberal pinko into a machine-gun-wielding NRA poster girl. Sarah Palin would be proud. Read more
Chemical Warfare- Andy McNab talks about the battle inside the mind of a soldier
Andy McNab talks to OntheBox’s McGee Noble about the time bomb of mental illness for soldiers and what inspired him to make Tour of Duty.
Andy McNab, better known as the mysterious silhouette behind the book cover of Bravo Two Zero, is a lot chirpier than you would imagine. Talking on the phone I comment that he must have been busy since I heard him only a few hours ago on Absolute FM giving an interview. “Haven’t even had a cuppa tea yet!” he laughs in response.
I ask him if he would mind answering a few questions of my dad’s, as he’s a massive fan, and he roars with laughter. “Ok then,” he tells me.
Yet for all his cheeriness, this is a man who has been deep into combat, had a bounty on his head and who has been trained in counter terrorism, demolitions and prime target elimination. In other words, he is a highly trained killer. He has also, in the name of his country, Read rest of article
Friday’s TV: The dangers of playing dirty
UNREPORTED WORLD: PHILLIPINES’ DIRTY WORLD, Channel 4, Friday 14th November, 7:30pm Alert me
If there were ever two social theorists looking down (or up, depending on what class you belong to) and thinking “f*ck” it would be Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. In truth, no one can deny the nobility of communism’s attempts to solve the problems inherent in capitalist economies. The basic problem is that while communism works perfectly well in theory, its various incarnations – Leninism, Stalinism, Maoism and Trotskyism – always seem to come out like the first batch of Ripley clones in Alien Resurrection.
In the latest episode of Channel 4’s Unreported World, Evan Williams reports from the Philippines, a country with a human rights record that read like Tolstoy, where a …Read rest of Article
Thursday’s TV: So celebs eat together, big deal
CELEBRITY COME DINE WITH ME, Channel 4, Thursday 13th November, 8pm Alert me
Exactly why celebs bother putting themselves through reality TV still perplexes me. The reasons cited are many: ‘I want to reinvent myself’; ‘I want the world to see the real me’. Really? I fail to see how eating bugs with more legs than their IQ or living isolated in a house for 3 months moaning about the pressures of choosing Prada over Chanel can really achieve that.
The only consolation for me is that, more often than not they rip out what little dignity these people – and I use the word people loosely – have left and reduce them to quivering, crying heaps that I can laugh, point at, or generally despise (would 2006 Celebrity Love Island’s Brendan Cole aka “Bombhead” please stand up).
Kicking off the brand new prime-time series of Come Dine With Me, producers have …Read rest of article
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