Did You See That

I had completely forgotten about this classy contemporary drama but I was browsing Amazon and saw it was available on DVD, so ordered it to remind myself how good it was. Set in Manchester, it’s a brilliantly non linear drama around a love triangle. Fi is with Jase, but has chemistry with his best friend Nathan (the story’s narrator). Nathan is in love with Fi. Jase love’s Fi, but also enjoying loving men. Nathan knows about this, but being Jase’s best friend, can’t tell Fi, even though he loves and could get her himself.

Really a lot of fun and one of the better pieces of original programming from BBC Three. Check it out if you haven’t seen it.

Saw this cool video on London Tonight, where a group of dancers perform to Michael Jackon’s Thriller on a London tube train, whilst passengers just awkwardly watch, or try not to, and then politely applaud at the end.

I think the main dancer guy - Remy I think his name was - did a particularly amazing job! Remy… it rhymes with Dreamy… how apt!

In last night’s final, John won this year’s version of Celebrity Big Brother - where talented young people made up the housemates and celebrities took over as Big Brother. John, who is a young Scottish politician - cruelly labelled by some as the “honey monster” - probably had this competition sewn up on the first night when he was forced to undertake a number of cringemaking, humiliating tasks at the behest of first hijacker, Matt Lucas. Telling Jeremy - a young racing driver who confuses cynicism with intelligence - he looked like Harry Potter was my personal favourite.

Personally, I would have bet serious money that Anthony would have won. Great looking, all round nice guy, he seemed a shoe-in to me, but we should never ever underestimate the power or the Scottish bloc vote - see Michelle McManus and X-Factor’s Leon for evidence. To be fair though, John did seem a genuine person and very well adjusted.

This was also Dermot’s last outing as a Big Brother presenter, as he is now giving it up to concentrate on X Factor in the Summer.

What did you think of Big Brother Celebrity Hijack? Did John deserve to win?

Catch up with this and other Channel 4 shows by using the free catch up service, 4OD.

Week Three of the nation’s favourite celebrity ice dancing show, and the competition continues to hot up.

Chris Fountain, who was caked in make up, did a brilliant job and even managed to skate on one foot whilst he had his partner lifted. Gareth Gates did a really good job but something about him says to me “top 3″. I don’t think he has what it takes to win this competition. Michael Underwood has sadly pulled out after breaking his ankle, and came on for a quick blub about that. I was pleased to see Fred Palascak come back to accompany the understudy celeb - Zaraah Abrahams from Coronation Street. It looked like Fred was gone for another year after Sarah Green’s early exit in Week One, but fate has been kind to us and he and Zaara put on a great display.

Greg Rusedski wore a tux and managed to live out some naff James Bond fantasy. Jason’s comment that it was a good idea to latch on to a persona to make up for his lack of one was cruel, but true. Aggi was her normal wobbley self but I think her plea to the viewers to keep her in so she can spend more time with Sergei may have resonated with some generous voter.

The skate off this week was between Samantha Mumba and Steve Backley, with all the judges backing Steve to come back next week.  It was sad to see Samantha Mumba - who I refer to simply as “Sam Mum” - in the bottom two again. She seems a nice girl and certainly not the worst skater, so it’s a shame she didn’t have the fan base to keep her in.

The media were invited to Pinewood studios today where the title of the next Bond film has been announced - “Quantum of Solace”. The ITV lunchtime news had a report which included some sneak previews from the forthcoming film…

What do you think of the title? It doesn’t exactly roll of the tongue but I’m sure we’ll get used to it!

Week 2 of Dancing on Ice, and our wobbly celebrities were back on the ice. Tim Vincent seemed a hundred times better than last week. His reward for this? Lumped in the bottom two with Natalie Pinkham (who?), although he survived to fight another week.

Last week I suggested Greg dance to Monster Mash. This week, Jason referenced that song too. If you’re reading Jason, try and get your own material! Greg does look awful on the ice though, and I can’t see him being able to progress too much further.

Chris Fountain and Gareth Gates were both excellent, and it will be interesting to see who has the bigger fan base as competition get to its later stages.

Linda Lusardi scored a 6 from Nicky, though he claimed this was a mistake. I thought maybe it was another clumsy attempt to cop off on TV after his romantic poem for Sarah Green last week.

What did you think?

Ok, we usually stick to stuff we’ve seen on TV for this blog, but here’s an exception. A Stockport teacher - Sarah Green - has been suspended from her job after a video of her was found on YouTube, which is mildly fruity. There’s a short version (actually better), and a longer one which is a bit ruder. Here’s both below (the teacher plays the receptionist in the first part of the video).

Short Advert

Longer Advert

What do you think? Should a teacher be punished for things done before she was a teacher? I think if the school decides to get rid of her, she won’t be short of offers from lads mags etc, although presumably she went into teaching for a vocation and it seems a tad unfair to miss out on that if that’s what she wants to do, and is trained to do.

Here’s that catchy Halifax advert with Thomas singing “Something Good”…

What do you think - will Simon Cowell be banging at Thomas’ door? I think he’s pretty good!

It was the return of Dancing on Ice with a new Sunday night slot. Personally I prefer it as a Saturday night show, but it was still a welcome return for those still with withdrawal symptoms following the end of Strictly.

This year’s celebrities include: Sarah Green, Gareth Gates, Chris Fountain, Tim Vincent, Steve Backley, Suzanne Shaw and Linda Lusardi.

It looked to my untrained eye like Chris Fountain was the best on the night, with a raw enthusiasm and and an ability to move around the ice at speed and not leave you too worried he was on the verge of stacking it (despite the VT). Greg Rusedki was the poorest for my money, and judge Jason was very apt when he said it was like Herman Munster. In fact, next week, I think Greg should dance to Monster Mash by Bobby Pickett.

Unfortunately it was Sarah Greene that went out after a skate off with Sam Mumba. This felt cruel on so many levels. Here was her former Going Live co host Philip Schofield presenting a prime time ITV1 show, and here was her booted out after episode one. And poor Fred, her partner, last year partnered with Kay Burley and this year he got Sarah. Give the man something to work with please!

The strangest moment of the night though was Nicky Slater’s odd poem that he wrote for Sarah Greene. Come on Nicky. If you want to come on to her the poor woman, don’t be so clumsy as to do it whilst her husband and the rest of the country are watching on TV.

Was Sarah the right choice to go? Who did you think deserved to go??

Dancing on Ice… on YouTube

Gareth Gates

Chris Fountain

This was the first night of an interesting new double act on ITV1.

Moving Wallpaper was a comedy following the creative team, under the lead of producer Jonathan Pope (played by Ben Miller), developing a new soap called Echo Beach. Their fruits of their labour was showing directly after.

The show reminded me a bit of Rob Brydon’s Annually Retentive, but whereas that interspersed the production and the product (as has been seen elsewhere), this seeks to create two separate programs which should both be able to stand on their own two feet.

I got a few laughs out of Moving Wallpaper. The headbutting of Michael Grade’s photo, the Simon Cowell references and using the Soap Awards categories as plot guides got a chuckle. Echo Beach - a sort of Hollyoaks by the beach - fared less well. I couldn’t give it any emotional investment because I was too busy looking for any gags which might link it back to Moving Wallpaper, such as Martine McCutheon’s dress. You could get away with it as an after lunch soap, but it’s not funny enough as a comedy or credible enough as a drama to warrant a 9.30pm scheduling.

Interesting experiment, but I hope it doesn’t go on too long.