Television Archives (23 posts)
Dexter
Dexter is one of the shows that I’ve heard about through magazines and newspaper articles, knew was a good show but couldn’t be bothered to watch. It wasn’t until I looked at my brother’s Facebook page, and noticed that Dexter was one of his favourite shows, that I decided to give it a look.
I’m hooked. I watched all of season one last week until I was bleary-eyed. Michael C. Hall is fabulously creepy as the main character, Dexter. Erik King plays potty-mouth Sergeant James Doakes who can’t stand Dexter and suspects that he’s hiding something.
My other favourite character from the show is C.S. Lee as Vince Masuka. Lee steals just about every scene that he is in and provides plenty of comic relief to a dark, gruesome show.
Posted in Television at 8:26 PM | Comments (2)
Tim Kring admits that season 2 of Heroes has been weak
If you’re a fan of the television show Heroes then you know that the second season has been terrible. Series creator Tim Kring admitted this earlier in the week and has vowed to put the show back on track.
The Dec. 3 episode will has been reworked to act as a season finale. This will give Kring and his writers a chance to start fresh and put the show back on track for the second half of the season two.
Say goodbye to some of the worst television romance in recent history — no more cherry trees and Hiro kissing a Japanese princess. Say goodbye to Claire and her ‘fly’ boyfriend. In an EW.com interview, Kring says, “I don’t think romance is a natural fit for us.”
The pacing has been way too slow and the introduction of some new heroes has been terrible. What happened to the cliff hangers from last year? The show needs to be a little less Love Story and a little more Bourne Ultimatum to win back viewers. Episode 6 was a step in the right direction.
Posted in Television at 10:54 PM | Comments (3)
The IT Crowd may not air on NBC
Writer/director Graham Linehan has a blog in which he recently discussed his television show The IT Crowd. In the US, NBC has been working on an American version of this hit TV show from the UK, but according to Linehan it may never air.
News reached me a while back that there may not be a US version of The IT Crowd. Apparently, there’s been a change of management at NBC and they’ve gone off the idea. I found this out on the Internet, which is how I find out all my information on the US IT Crowd.
It doesn’t sound like NBC is communicating at all with Linehan which I find odd. Stranger still, is that the US pilot is an exact copy of the British pilot.
Zap2it reported back in September that NBC May Unplug ‘IT Crowd’. The site also mentioned that the female lead, Jessica St. Clair was no longer part of the show. The show still isn’t in production and with only a pilot in the can, things don’t look very good.
If you’re a fan of the show then you’ll want to read Notes on the U.S. IT Crowd on Linehan’s blog.
Posted in Television at 9:44 PM | Comments (3)
The IT Crowd on NBC
The other night I watched the season finale of the hilarious British television comedy, The IT Crowd. I’m not sure if the UK’s Channel 4 has plans to do a third season but NBC in the US has “Americanized” the show and will be releasing it midseason!
NBC did this with The Office and has had a lot of success. For their version of The IT Crowd, NBC recruited Richard Ayoade who plays the character of Moss in the original version of The IT Crowd.
I don’t know. I love the British version of the show and think it will be difficult to enjoy and American update. I’ll probably watch just to see more of Richard Ayoade.
Visit NBC for video and images of the new version of The IT Crowd.
Posted in Television at 9:46 AM | Comments (3)
The IT Crowd
Some of my favourite television shows are across the pond in the UK. The IT Crowd is the funniest show I’ve watched this year. The first season consisted of only six episodes. Watch the first episode and you’ll be hooked. Our family has watched season one a few times.
When you can laugh at show after multiple viewings and never tire of the characters you have a hit show. Season Two of the IT Crowd is coming soon (in the UK) which means you’ll be able to find a torrent or two for the new shows.
Thanks to my buddy Dave for making me watch the entire season at his house. Dave, I disagree with you. I do not look like the character of Moss (above right). And thanks to Neal for introducing the show to Dave.
Posted in Television at 4:41 PM | Comments (2)
Don’t Stop Believin’
iTunes will be selling a lot of tracks for Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’ this morning. I can’t get the song out of my head after watching The Sopranos series finale last night.
When the show ended with Perry singing “don’t stop believen’” and the screen cutting abruptly to black, I thought my satellite feed went dead. When the credits rolled without any music and I realized David Chase pulled a fast one on us.
Without giving any more away, I thought the ending to one of the series on television was innovative and refreshing. It also leaves the show open to movie possibilities.
Posted in Television at 11:32 AM | Comments (1)
Bloody Chickentown
If you watched The Sopranos on Sunday night then you might be wondering who performed the song that played over the last scene and the credits. Evidently Chickentown is the name of the song and it was performed by punk-poet John Cooper Clarke.
Evidently Chickentown is from Clarke’s 1980 album Snap, Crackle & Bop. Clarke raps over some drums to create a dark, haunting song that was ahead of its time. The music works perfectly with the tone of the latest Sopranos episode.
I’m always amazed how David Chase and the show’s producers manage to come up with some obscure piece of music that blends perfectly with a particular scene. Reuters says that the show “will be remembered as the series that had the best music in the history of TV”.
More info on John Cooper Clarke:
johncooperclarke.com
myspace.com/johncooperclarke
Posted in Music and Television at 10:29 AM | Comments (1)
24 hours of graphic violence
Has anyone noticed how brutally graphic the television show 24 has become?
In last night’s episode Morris (Carlo Rota) was beaten to a pulp. That wasn’t enough gore for Fox though. A Muslim terrorist named Fayed took a power drill and pushed it into Morris’ back so that he’d arm a nuclear bomb. Just in case you didn’t believe Morris’ screams of pain, blood was spattered on the faces of people as the drill went into Morris’ back.
At this point in the show I felt sick. Sick as in, how I felt when I watched Michael Madsen’s character cut off a policeman’s ear in the Tarantino film, Resrevoir Dogs.
Does anyone in the US or Canada see a problem with showing this kind of violence on television? Is seeing a nipple on the half-time show of the Super Bowl worse than this kind of violence?
Fox seems more concerned with stories like, Controversy Sprouts Over Prince’s Super Bowl Halftime Show than the graphic violence in their shows. I mean come on, are people really that bent out of shape about seeing Prince’s shadow?
I don’t want to sound like a prude or a hypocrite but I was more than a little surprised by last night’s episode and I’m starting to lose interest in the show. Maybe I’m just getting too old for this stuff.
Posted in Television at 4:17 PM | Comments (8)
VisualHub for Mac OS X
Now and again I come across a really great piece of software for Mac OS X. VisualHub has become one of my favourite tools for dealing with video on the Mac.
For $23.32 USD you can easily convert DivX video into a DVD. If I miss an episode of 24 or House I do the following:
- head over to btjunkie and do a search for the latest show episode
- download the show using Xtorrent
- try to catch up on client work while the show downloads (losing battle)
- check the downloaded show in VLC
- open the file up in VisualHub and click on the DVD tab
- catch up on client work while the video is being converted
- burn my show to disc
I could save a lot of time and just burn the .AVI file to DVD and watch the show on my Philips DivX player. The problem is that this DVD player isn’t hooked up to my home theatre with HD projector. I could also get a PVR but this is more fun.
I’ve also used VisualHub to convert video from YouTube (.FLV format) to DV format which can then be used in Final Cut Pro. I couldn’t produce Livebait.tv without VisualHub.
One of the things that makes this program so amazing is the simplicity behind it. Take a look at the user interface.
Reminds me of SuperDuper — another great piece of software that I use for backups.
I’m just discovering that VisualHub does a better job at creating iPod video than Quicktime Pro. You have more control over the compression settings allowing you to reduce the size of the video files.
Okay. Enough geeky rambling. If you need to convert video to different formats then look no further than VisualHub.
Posted in OS X Software and Television at 5:05 PM | Comments (0)
Kramer At The Laugh Factory
There is a very funny video on YouTube called Seinfeld Lost Episode - Kramer At The Laugh Factory that has some clever editing. It matches footage from Seinfeld with Michael Richards’ racist outburst a couple of weeks ago at the Laugh Factory. Poor Kosmo Kramer.
Posted in Television at 4:57 PM | Comments (1)
Heroes Recap: Six Months Ago
There is a good summary of last night’s episode of Heroes at Fangasm. If you’re a fan of the show or you missed last night’s episode then you’ll want to read the recap.
Posted in Television at 4:19 PM | Comments (0)
Ed Bradley, Veteran CBS Newsman, Dies
Wow, I had no idea that Ed Bradley was ill. Just two weeks ago he had a segment air on 60 Minutes. He was only 65.
I grew up watching 60 Minutes and still count it as one of my favourite shows. It won’t be the same without Ed Bradley. He’ll be missed.
Posted in News and Television at 3:06 AM | Comments (1)
More Gigs
Lately my Macintosh (Dual 1.8 GHz PowerPC G5) has been feeling a little sluggish. Photoshop CS2 occasionally takes a coffee break, Safari seems a little slow at loading pages and I’m always low on hard disk storage.
RAM
I doubled my RAM to 2 GB and things seem to be zipping along again. Because I’m using Photoshop and often working with 16-bit images I would probably benefit from even more memory.
Storage
My internal 150 GB hard disk has only 6 GB of space left. Who would have thought that applications would every be 400 - 500 GB in size? It doesn’t help that I have 12 GB of RAW photos to archive.
I have an external 120 GB LaCie drive and it is almost full as well. Solution? Call up TigerDirect.ca and order a 500 MB Seagate internal drive (7200/16MB/SATA). That should last for a couple of years (or until I dump another 186,500 photos on there).
Does anyone have any tips on how to speed up an old G5?
Posted in Apple and Television at 4:50 PM | Comments (0)
Shows I’m watching
For the last couple of years I haven’t watched a lot of TV. I’ve spent a lot of my time watching films instead.
Last year I started watching House and was completely hooked. The Sopranos is another show I love and am looking forward to when it resumes.
I took a look at Desperate Housewives and felt like I was watching recycled Melrose Place episodes. I also watched an episode of Standoff on Fox. Groan.
Two shows have caught my eye and I’m tuning in every week. The first show is Heroes on NBC. Awesome! It has a great blend of mystery, interconnected plot lines (think Syrianna, Traffic, Babel) and some supernatural elements that give it an X-Files feel.
The second show that impressed me was The Nine on ABC. It features an ensemble — nine strangers come together during a bank robbery that turns into a messy, 52-hour hostage situation. The series looks at how this experience has changed the people involved. There is also a lot of uncertainty as to what happened during the hostage crisis. A little bit is revealed each episode.
What are your must-watch shows this season?
Posted in Television at 11:23 AM | Comments (8)
Jesus Camp
Back in August, James mentioned a new documentary film called Jesus Camp that looked pretty interesting if not disturbing. A few days ago a clip called Bill Maher Discussion about Jesus Camp showed up on YouTube that is excellent.
The discussion allows for several different viewpoints that I found fascinating. I think that I’ll have to fire up Xtorrent and get the September 22 broadcast of Real Time with Bill Maher.
Posted in Movies and Television at 10:55 AM | Comments (0)
Top Gear, Heroes and Xtorrent
Somehow I missed all the buzz surrounding the new show, Heroes on NBC. A couple of people (Neal/Dave) told me to check it out. So I’m downloading a copy of last night’s episode now using Xtorrent.
Up until now, I’ve been using Azureus to download my torrent files. Why switch? Xtorrent is a much slicker app—simpler and more Mac-like in terms of interface. Thanks to Ryan for suggesting I check it out.
Another story I missed concerns Top Gear. Apparently one of the shows stars, Richard ‘Hamster’ Hammond crashed a jet-powered dragster at 280 mph. The accident almost killed Hammond and now the show is postponed indefinitely.
The Daily Mail is reporting that Hammond wants the BBC to show the crash. He’s also willing to film from his hospital bed as he recovers from a serious brain injury.
Jeremy Clarkson, one of the show’s hosts said, “Swarms of bureaucratic bluebottles are nibbling away at the crash site on York airfield desperately trying to find some reason why Top Gear should be banished from our screens.” Hopefully the show will continue. It’s one of my favourites from the UK.
Posted in OS X Software and Television at 12:56 PM | Comments (0)
FinalGear.com
Last week I mentioned the television show Top Gear on BBC Two. Unfortunately I don’t have a PVR and I don’t live in the UK. Fortunately I do have a couple of DSL modems and a complete listing of Top Gear torrent files over at FinalGear.com.
FinalGear.com is a Top Gear fan site that you’ll want to bookmark if you like the show. I’ve watched all of season 8 so far and part of season 7. Seasons 3-8 are available online. Long live BitTorent — the poor man’s global PVR.
Posted in Television at 11:58 AM | Comments (1)
Top Gear
I’ve become addicted to Top Gear on BBC Two. James told me about the show and I’ve watched the first 4 episodes of the 8th season on DivX. Brilliant! As they like to say on the show.
I’m not really into ‘car shows’ but Top Gear isn’t just any car show. The production value is incredible. They test drive a lot of high-end cars like the Ferrari F60 Enzo or Lotus Exige S. The hosts quite often slam GM for problems with the latest Cadillac or tell you how ugly they think a Porsche SUV is. You’d never see this on a North American show where automobile ads appear every commercial break.
Top Gear is also incredibly funny and the 3 hosts do some crazy things to vehicles each week — making a convertible out of a minivan and taking it through a car wash.
Each episode also features a celebrity driver like chef Gordon Ramsay or actor Ewan McGregor who compete for the fastest lap times around a race track. Forget about Pimp My Ride and the other car shows out there. This is the best one on TV. Period.
Posted in Television at 4:28 PM | Comments (1)
The Sopranos and House
I recently watched the season premiere of The Sopranos in HD and all I can say is “wow!”
It’s been a long wait for season 6 and the first episode was worth the wait. The writing and the acting on this show is so finely tuned now that each episode is like watching a four star movie. And to think I resisted watching for the first four seasons. What was I thinking?
The HBO microsite for the The Sopranos has a great feature called Sopranos Maps. It uses Google Maps to show you key locations from Season 5. Each location has a video clip and episode synopsis. Brilliant!
Another show that I can’t get enough of these days is House on Fox. This is another show I resisted and had no interest in whatsoever. A friend of mine in Vancouver forced me to watch an episode and now I’m hooked. I downloaded the first 10 episodes of Season 2 (via BitTorents) and can’t get enough of this show.
The writing is clever and quite funny. Hugh Laurie is perfect in the role of Dr. Gregory House. The special effects are pretty amazing in some episodes. Should I continue or are you going to tune on March 28 for the next episode?
Posted in Television at 5:55 PM | Comments (6)
Cinema Reel
If you can’t wait for Hot Docs next year then tune into CBC for Cinema Reel — a documentary film festival airing on CBC. CBC Newsworld will air a documentary every night between Dec 1 - Dec 6.
If that doesn’t excite you then you may be interested in the online contest to WIN A CINEMA REAL WEEKEND IN WHISTLER. Thanks to James for this info.
Posted in Television at 10:34 AM | Comments (0)
Hello, we have HDTV.
The step-daughter is watching The O.C. on FOX. It’s one of the few television shows that is broadcast in HDTV and she’s watching the regular broadcast. I’m in shock and ask her why she’d want to watch the “crappy” version of the show—the version that isn’t in widescreen with Dolby Digital sound.
I received a simple shrug and a brief explanation that it’s too much work to go all the way up to channel 800 (where the HDTV programming is). Hmm, is it just me or is anyone else suprised that some people don’t use the number buttons on television remotes?
Posted in Television at 8:46 PM | Comments (2)
Super Bowl Commercials
When I had the guys over for the Super Bowl on the weekend, the Ameriquest commercials received the biggest laughs. My favourite is the guy making a dinner for his wife when things go horribly wrong.
If you missed any of the Ameriquest commercials then you can watch them here.
Posted in Humour and Television at 10:46 PM | Comments (0)
A Boy’s Dream
Somehow I missed this. Guy Ritchie directed a 60 second ad for GM that features a kid driving around in the new Corvette. Okay, so maybe this kid was driving a little too fast and performing a few too many Dukes of Hazzard jumps, but come on, he’s just day-dreaming.
Back in August, seven auto safety groups thought the ad looked too real, too unsafe, and asked that GM pull the ad. They did. Wimps.
If you missed it, you can still view the ad here. QuickTime required. Thanks to Graham for the link.
Posted in Television at 7:42 PM | Comments (1)
