Freeview Boxes : Classic or Dud?

Wait, is this a channel called Drama, showing a programme (new?) called Annika? With an English actress playing a Scandinavian in Scotland? And it's all taken from Radio 4 ?!?

Channel 20 yes. mostly old episodes of the bill and to the manor born and stuff of that ilk. also handy for repeats of dickens adaptations.

Annika is not new, but is new to me (oh, 2021 it says). if i'm unsure it's because Drama is all repeats so it's been shown somewhere before (oh, Alibi (uktv / Sky) and Masterpiece in the US).

https://corporate.uktv.co.uk/news/article/uktv-tv-adaptation-radio-4-drama-annika-alibi/

For anyone who fancies staying up till 2.45am on Wednesday, Talking Pictures is showing "Thomasine and Bushrod", a Blaxploitation Western from 1974... with music by Arthur Lee!

^ that's not showing up in the epg yet (or in my listings mag for this week or next)

they missed a trick by not calling the new Vic Reeves And His Wife Paint Birds show on sky arts Paint Along With Nancy (and Jim)

it's multiple episodes and has special guests (including edwin collins) so i'm sold.

i don't enjoy celeb stuff but god bless Nancy Kaminsky

the Architecture of Railways show on Yesterday continues to be little gem of a thing. always something interesting on it, like the brutalist, analog electronic signal box in birmingham the other week.

is that the one with the Icelandic presenter i have a sad crush on because yeah it's good and largely annoyance-free

the main presenter is tim dunn, but he does a london underground spin-off with a woman who could possibly be icelandic and has a name that's almost but not quite sidney. (googles... siddy, Sigurbjörg Alma Ingólfsdóttir)

(that signalbox in full - https://www.birminghamworld.uk/news/birmingham-new-street-signal-box-tour-4087955 )

yeah that's right, i googled cos there's something in her tone that feels not full english and i figured she was either mad posh or not a native speaker

or both! both are possible lol

so after the Twilight Zone series 1 they are showing Twilight Zone series 1... (i have the first two seasons on dvd, i was hoping to get to see the rest)

but there are new Bob's Burgers on itv2 as of yesterday. late last night's (repeated 8 today) was a halloween episode and the kids always have good punning costumes

Gradiator (graduate / gladiator), Sherlock Ness Monster, Peter Pan's Labyrinth

The second half of the 8pm double-bill last night (well, we watched it at 9:30pm on +1) was unfamiliar to us and I think everything in the 2023 run so far had been repeats.
I do miss Bob and Linda when they're not on. And Teddy, especially Teddy.

Slits documentary on London Live last night has some great home movie footage. also touches on the Nora / John lydon relationship mentioned in the obit thread.

> And Teddy, especially Teddy.

you're in for a treat tonight then

itv2 has just started Dawson's Creek from the beginning. i remember it as one of a bunch of sassy teen dramas around that time (party of five, my so-called life). was odd how much of it i remembered. the only thing that strikes me as odd is that he's film obsessed but doesn't seem to rate anybody beyond spielberg.

Dr Morbius the early years

Dawson's movie love is very Gregg Turkington yes, iirc they do also watch Casablanca.

Annika being shown on BBC1 on saturday, i notice. odd that it was on Drama first, it's usually the other way around.

Psycho is showing when he goes to sign up for film classes and they all go to the cinema to see some film that they don't ever name (and i didn't recognise. oh, Waitng for Guffman it says on the cinema)

Fireball XL5 on TPTV from saturday. 1962. so after Supercar but before Stingray.

also on TPTV, Picnic At Hanging Rock - 21:30 on Saturday and 21:00 next Monday.

Chimes At Midnight was on TPTV too on Saturday night(?)

haha yes I reviewed that on the last podcast (I review Picnic on the current one)

i semi-watched Chimes on Saturday night, it deserves its rep imo

A friend asked me if TPTV were showing a restored version of Chimes, but I didn't know. My memory is that it was the sound recording that was in most of need of fixing, rather than the image quality.

it looked and sounded fine to me

Looked and sounded good.

probably the best place to note that Network DVD have just gone into administration. 😞

that sky arts documentary about female electronic artists is on again tonight, quarter past midnight.

fireball xl5 was a bit hokey and sexist but the things that were always good, like the vehicle designs and general model making, were already there.

M Hulot's Holiday on Talking Pictures TV at 19:00 on the 9th of July. Also, for the Umberto Lenzi completists in the house, Sandokan: Pirate Of Malaysia at 14:50 on the 8th.

july!?

Yes. Bit early to set your DVRs I realise, but I received the spreadsheet today and it's unlikely I would remember to give the heads up closer to the date.

That gives me enough time to decide if I'm an Umberto Lenzi completist or not.

I've never got to see The Sailor Who Feel from Grace with the Sea tho it's a book I'm very fond of, thanks Talking Pictures

Fell, either way spellcheck

i figured sky arts was just endlessly repeating the first 4 seasons of Alfred Hitchcock Presents but noticed today that it's s06e04 so I've missed a truckload (which they will repeat, endlessly)

I've never got to see The Sailor Who Feel from Grace with the Sea tho it's a book I'm very fond of, thanks Talking Pictures

Started watching it but the Sailor took forever to show up and when he did it was an almost comatose Kris Kristoffersen.

i was maybe a bit drunker and more distractable than i'd realised but i'll try to stick it out on demand or something

it's on again tomorrow at 9

Jesse James meets Frankenstein's Daughter is quite a juxtaposition

mudlarking on the thames. London Live. does what it says on the tin really. cheap tv, head-mounted camera, first person view, often of nothing but the ground. lots of buttons, lots of coins, lots of broken clay pipes*, the odd foot high Nkondi in the shape of a dog...

*all these clay pipes still hanging around after hundreds of years - the disposable vapes of their time.

(pipes were 1700-1770 apparently)

Secrets of the London Underground is back, and about camden this week. hadn't realised it was bombed during the war.

TPTV just showed the episode of The Edgar Wallace Mystery Theatre, "Strangler's Web", which had Pauline Boty, the pop artist in it. much bigger role than the Maigret episode they showed around christmas.

TPTV have had a couple of screenings of Sam Fuller's Underworld USA this week - would recommend if it comes round again.

Saw on Monday night (I think).

repeats of repeats of the Twilight Zone on legend has just shown the one in the first series where it breaks the 4th wall and it's probably the most effective version of that i've ever seen.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_World_of_Difference (oh, richard matheson)

(although probably the highlight of the entire first season happens in episode 1...)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WH2S4kg2tY8

forgot to mention that I saw a film on tp the other week I think was called " the day the world caught fire" about the west and Russia conducting nuclear tests at exactly the same time unbeknownst to each other causing environmental changes that lead to the end of the world. told from the pov of a British newspaper. p enjoyable dialogue.

Excellent film.