Be Excellent To Each Other

BBC 4's Timeshift - the Nation's Railway: the golden age of British Rail. Good use of archive footage, especially from BR's film unit, to illustrate the history of BR. I rather like footage of '60s futurism.

The 80s with Dominic Sandbrook (BBC2).

I'm a big fan of both Sandbrook's bulky but very readable series of books on modern British history and his various TV documentaries, and how he uses popular culture to advance his arguments. I enjoyed this first episode tonight, but felt that he was a little too hasty in skipping from point to point without making a clear connection or wrapping up one part sufficiently. You know how when as a student you'd be stuck writing an essay so would just repeat your main point at the end of each paragraph without really relating it to the preceding sentences ('this thing clearly shows that avarice defined the decade')? It felt like that at times. But I'm a big fan and if you like social history you'll like it.

"Go 8 Bit" is a new TV quiz show hosted by Dara O'Brien on Dave where contestants play old games.

It starts on Monday 7th.

And will probably be rubbish.

A friend just pointed me in the direction of this, very good show well worth a watch.

BBC Four: Illuminations: The Private Lives of Medieval Kings. Illuminated manuscript porn, with focus on episode one of the earliest such examples especially from the time of Aethelstan and Edgar the Peaceable. Marred by too much 'I'm really excited to be holding this book'.

Go 8-bit

http://uktvplay.uktv.co.uk/shows/dara-o ... 4467186001

Ahem.

Your post didn't count as Monday isn't the 7th.

And if you follow my link you can watch it (from the middle of last week)

'The Last Leg' goes back to its roots for the Paralympics. First one is 20:00 on C4 tonight.

Yeah, that was painfully bad.

Next episode : http://uktvplay.uktv.co.uk/shows/dara-o ... 2808717001

Regarding The Archers, I celebrated on Sunday after the verdict was announced. I just hope they don't turn Rob into a pantomime villain as we start the family court stage or as he wanders round the village. Still, at least we can now go back to worrying about the more important issues of the flower and produce show or who will be doing the Christmas extravaganza.

Or the singke wicket competition NO I AM NOT GETTING SUCKED IN AGAIN

So, the BBC decides Bake Off is too expensive.

Gosh.

Its at the peak of its popularity and I guess they can asked for more money which C4 can pay thanks to lots of advert breaks.

BBC are always under pressure for what they pay for shows and people.

Rock and a hard place. They're under immense pressure to cut costs, and by all accounts the GBBO people wanted insane money.

It'll be interesting to see what it means regarding people - can the BBC keep the presenters and just do another baking show? Will Channel 4 retain ratings?

Seems the worst of both worlds to me, though the execs who own the rights will obviously get a massive payout and not really care if it goes down the tubes in a couple of years.

Never mind, it's a load of shit anyway. They should just replace it with Robot Wars, like Top Gear.

New Robot Wars isn't that good

And, wait, isn't on BBC.

Wash your mouth out

Was it 20 million they wanted?

It was great (well better than Top Gear or the Shitty Cake Programme at any rate).


And it was on the BBC, in the Top Gear slot, until it finished a couple of weeks ago.

Oh, I watched it on Challenge.

The BBC can't win. They get criticised for "wasting" taxpayers' money and criticised for not keeping their best shows and talent.

This year's series of Bake Off is awful. I can bake better than any of the contestants this year and I don't even own an oven. They clearly peaked with Nadia last year, now they can just stop pretending that anyone will ever overtake that. And she's lovely and beautiful, so the show might as well go elsewhere.

I like the nonsense email sent out to production company staff:



It's not about the money (totally about the money, guys) we didn't want to leave the BBC, but money.

I'm henceforth forever going to refer to money as 'comfort'.

They must have known there'd be a backlash over dropping Bake Off though, right? It's one of the UK's best-loved TV shows.

Notably, when they ditched The Voice, no-one gave a shit.

To be honest now that they've said it's going to C4 I don't reckon there'll be all that much fuss. If it had gone to Sky or some other paid thing then the Daily Mail would have lead a national shit fit.

I wouldn't be surprised if at least some of the presenters remained with the BBC. Depends how large the wheelbarrows of cash are, I expect.

They work for the production company, surely?

I would have thought that, yes.

Nope. They bought the IP but not the presenters.

Huh.

What is good for?

Then why not just make their own cooking show that follows a similar format. It's not like they have a monopoly on creating reality TV shows in the same format.

Grim...'s comment about 'The Voice' is an interesting comparison. We can imagine any commercial channel going for it, as it's an obvious format to compete/complement an existing hit. Would ITV have gambled on a peak-time baking competition being a smash?

BBC were 10 Million short to retain the Great British Bake off!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-37349837

Also saying that separate negotiations need to be done with the judges and presenters

I'd love it if Channel 4 paid £25mm for the show, and the presenters stayed on the BBC for "It's Fucking Cake Time, Bitches!"

I'm not really sure how they were supposed to convince you to pay them what they wanted, then.

I duct taped their loved ones to an office chair and pushed them down a lift shaft.

Yes, but what about the negotiations?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-37355065

The hosts have said they won't go to C4.

Also the 25 million is per year!!

They make 10 episodes per season and its made of of mostly Joe Public and a few ovens!

Well that's £25 million down the shitter.

[edit] Oh wait, it's only Mel and Sue that won't be going. It's the judges that really matter.

I'd watch Derren Brown's Bake Off. He'd convince the contestants that if they stare at the dough for long enough it'll rise all of its own accord.

Don't know if this has been covered already, but there's been a spate of excellent sitcom pilots on the BBC and Channel 4.

The Circuit - penned by Sharon Horgan, it's a nicely dark 30 minutes of the world's most awkward dinner party. Great concept in terms of shaping future episodes, which will presumably be one dinner party per episode.

Motherland - another one by Sharon Horgan (and also Graham Linehan). It's a dive into the nastiness of mums. Manages to avoid feeling cliched by virtue of having a real edge and bite to the humour.

People Just Do Nothing - not new, but I caught an episode of it for the first time last week and it's outstanding. It's a fake documentary about a pirate radio station, with some ludicrous characters, including this guy.

I have also just discovered this and agree with the above muchly. Just got on to Season 2 - it's all on iPlayer so easy enough to watch.

DJ Beats is one of my new favourite comedy characters.

Noice, I'll fire up the iPlayer tonight!

Superb, possibly inadvertent, faux pas on the 'Last Leg' just now.

IDGI

Is it because video games aren't part of the paralympics? I dunno

That's not a faux pas though, is it?

Oh, unless it's about Oscar Pistorious [sp], I guess.