What I mean is that we could be living in the year 1984. Life feels like an interactive episode of Ashes To Ashes except that we’ve got better mobile phones and Michael Jackson is a bit dead. We could knock on his tombstone and ask him to re-do the Thriller video without having to waste time and money on makeup. I remember once upon a time in the realms of international cultural warfare (the Eurovision Song Contest) a woeful Estonian band stood on a stage in Latvia and warned about the ‘Eighties Coming Back’....

Savaged! My instant response to reading the news that John Landis’ legendary lycanthrope flick isn’t impervious to attacks from modern hacks was definitely one of sadness; I don’t see a single shred of merit in the idea of remaking the 1981 movie. What I do see, though, is a cynical attempt to surf the wave of momentum generated by other ‘new’ versions of old horror stories, like Halloween, The Hitcher and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre....

I say this because Hollywood is sick – even sicker than normal. We already knew that Sunset Strip is awash with titan migraines, venereal disease, substance abuse problems and psychological disorders. What we’re dealing with now, though, according to the freshly released film Contagion, is a health crisis that no spell in the Betty Ford Clinic or course of antibiotics will cure. This is the Black Death for the blockbuster era....

He’s a quiet guy called Jerry Bruckheimer, and occasionally he’ll dig deep into his precious pit of plenty and spread some of his resources to an exclusive bunch of industry figures who show reverence and loyalty. Sometimes the slightly supernatural aura of this mysterious man excites Nicolas Cage’s eccentric side and secures his support. Sometimes (well, every time) big shiny blockbuster movies get made. Sometimes Michael Bay gets to be director....

The Last Man on Earth: Season 2, Episode 13 “I’m sorry I didn’t have the balls to tell you that I don’t have the balls to give you children.” The topic of fertility might not be Last Man on Earth’s most exciting subject matter, in my opinion. It’s surely a reaction that I feel solely because it is fodder that has been done countless times before in sitcoms, with the move often being a death knell for the shows....

But in 2007 there was a show that dared to go against this stereotype. They took the bold step and made the scientists the stars of the show. Would they buck the trend of making the scientists uber nerds? Well, the answer is no. The stars of The Big Bang Theory are some of the geekiest television characters ever to grace your screen. But, and there is a ‘but’, it is an homage to the whole geek universe....

Tonight’s episode was not that. With varying levels of success, this outing of The Leftovers was the most eventful yet. Finally, The Leftovers seems like it has taken shape, or at least that the show is finally done setting the table and is now prepared to serve the dish. The show took lengths to raise the stakes for Kevin, and with the help of a brilliant performance by actress Ann Dowd, there were intense, gripping scenes....

As the evil king Amphitryon (Scott Adkins) grows more and more mad with power, conquering city-states and waging war in an effort to sate his blood lust, his wife Queen Alcmene (Roxanne McKee) turns to Hera and prays for deliverance, for safety, for someone to stop the king. That person turns out to be her son, Hercules (Kellan Lutz). Of course, first Zeus has to visit himself lustfully upon her to create the baby, and after that hilarious scene, the movie only seems to become more and more ludicrous....

This review contains spoilers. 2.6 Saint John Thematically and emotionally, The Missing series two struck all the right notes this week. The multiple plot strands coalesced in an episode that was alternately sickening, thrilling and moving. Sickening in the scenes showing Gettrick’s home life with Sophie and Lucy; thrilling in every step closer Julien came to discovering Adam and what really happened in Iraq in 1991; and moving just about every time Keeley Hawes and David Morrissey were on screen....

1.1 Always and Forever Elijah was introduced on The Vampire Diaries a whole half a season before Klaus, so it’s fitting that he is the one, as before, to introduce viewers to the world of the Mikaelson family. It’s a long and complicated story, which I admit I hadn’t really appreciated for a while, and there’s a heck of a lot of exposition to get out of the way. This was probably one of the major reasons for bringing Elijah to the fore in this episode, since he’s always been a brilliantly captivating deliverer of exposition, and he just about copes with it....

1.8 The River in Reverse We began the season with hopes of seeing the siblings come together to protect Hayley and her child, and we then continued to watch the three of them flake away from each other to opposite sides. This episode feels like some kind of breaking point for that, and Klaus basically winning his own personal war with Marcel means that a new thread is going to have to emerge to bring them together....

2.2 Alive And Kicking I always hated Kol. On a show (The Vampire Diaries that is) full of characters I either absolutely adore or violently dislike, Kol was definitely in the latter category. But that was then. Now? Call me fickle but Kol might be one of favourite characters on The Originals. That’s good, too, since the littlest Original looks set to play a huge part in season two. This episode was basically all about re-introducing him to new viewers and, despite some little anomalies I’m sure existing Kol fans will be able to point out, it did a good job of pitching him to sceptical people like me....

The Orville premiered on Sept. 10 at 8 p.m., pushed back by the NFL game initially, eventually moving to Thursdays at 9 p.m. Eastern. Season 1 then ran for 12 episodes through December 7, 2017. Here’s a clip from the finale to hold you over until season 2. The Orville Season 1 Episode Guide and Reviews The Orville got a rocky start with some critics, but the show definitely found its fan base....

That wasn’t the case thirty years ago when Ben Edlund created satirical comic book hero The Tick, nor when the character appeared in a 1994 Fox animated series or, briefly, a 2001 live-action comedy. The current glut either makes now the perfect time for a revival of Edlund’s character (every dominant cultural product needs a subversive sidekick) or risks it feeling crowded-out and irrelevant. Edlund has countered the potential irrelevancy of The Tick’s schtick by keeping this new pilot light on its titular character (Peter Serafinowicz) and focusing instead on sidekick Arthur (Griffin Newman)....

From the first page, we are taken away to an unfamiliar version of Earth, an Earth where men can wrestle giant space squid (and win!) and where a number of women simultaneously give birth to mysterious children that look like “Ingmar Bergman extras”. Enter Sir Reginald Hargreeves, a famous scientist and entrepreneur who is also, lo and behold, an alien. He adopts seven of the super-powered children and promptly disappears until, one day, the Eiffel Tower goes insane and aforementioned children – now The Umbrella Academy – have to stop it....

5.4 Slabtown That said, Beth has some serious work to do in order to carry an episode all by herself. Since she went missing at the end of last season, the only lead we’ve gotten is last week’s cross car, which Carol and Daryl go chasing after. We know they’ll eventually find Beth, but we don’t know just how long that might take or where Beth has been. Turns out, like the rest of the gang, she hasn’t gotten too far from home; she’s back in Atlanta....

1.1 Paradise Sold This time though, there’s little chance of Moss’ character falling for the charms of Peter Mullan’s horribly magnetic Matt Mitcham, a controlling alpha male whom episode one suggests may be responsible for the pregnancy of his twelve-year-old daughter, Tui. We first meet Tui in a scene that could have been bucolic were it not for the pallid tones, drifting mist and uneasy silence. Presented differently, a schoolgirl riding her bike past sheep and horses might have ushered us into a cosy countryside drama, but Top of the Lake is nothing of the sort....

Component parts are coming together in the latest episode of Torchwood: Miracle Day, an episode that sees the return of Wayne Knight and the introduction of Star Trek veteran John De Lancie. Wayne Knight is quite muted, as he was earlier in the series. But De Lancie? He’s having much more fun, and, were he given a bit more time, would have been one of the highlights of the episode....

Episode three, entitled Ghost Machine, focused primarily on one member of Torchwood Three: Owen. The doctor found himself obsessed with the long-forgotten murder and rape of a young woman after accidentally witnessing it through the “ghost machine” of the title. Gwen used it in the pre-credits sequence, coming face to face with the ghost of a young boy called Thomas, seemingly from the 40s. Upon further investigation, it turned out that the (alien) device simply converted the energy left by strong emotions into ghost-like recreations, as Gwen found upon meeting the present-day Thomas (a lovely cameo from John Normington)....

Watch it here You can watch it here ShroomsMore young, good-looking kids but this time we have a trailer that suggests a more intelligent horror within. Shrooms sees some American college types going camping in Ireland and taking some magic mushrooms (hence the title). As a killer comes on the scene while they’re still tripping, said college kids can’t separate what’s real from what’s not and, predictably, all hell breaks loose....