These final episodes are full of dramatic moments but they involve characters we’ve only just met and therefore are not too emotionally attached to. Saxon, the Brain Surgeon, is shaping up to be more interesting then I previously thought, but still, he’s no Big Bad like we’ve had in the past, and before tonight’s ending (which we’ll get to in a minute) there’s no real reason why Dexter has to take him down....
Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency Season 2 Episode 5 Sometimes good storytelling is about coming up with a creative way to have characters solve a conflict, and other times, as with this week’s Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, the different threads build to a moment of triumph, even though the story is far from over. As facts about Wendimoor’s origins, Amanda’s powers, Farah’s hangups, and Dirk’s fears unfolded, that crescendo across all storylines that peaked as Farah owned her freak status induced goosebumps....
Sylvester McCoy’s first series is an anomaly in Doctor Who‘s history. A fan would call it refreshing. Others would simply gape at the screen blowing bubbles in their spittle. Only Dragonfire commits the cardinal sin of being boring, certainly, and Paradise Towers is a great example of an excellent script let down by the production (and also by Richard Briers’ messing about). Often, however, the sheen of fun is not enough to prevent yourself from thinking, “Why is Sylvester McCoy (dressed as Colin Baker) playing the spoons on Kate O’Mara (dressed as Bonnie Langford)’s tits?...
Reading Nick Harkaway’s entry in to the Time Trips series led me to two main conclusions. Firstly, reading this will enhance your knowledge of adjectives. Secondly, since 2005, prose Doctor Who has had an increasing problem with its deployment of whimsy. Besides deploying a lot of Science-Fiction jargon, Harkaway takes the Tenth Doctor’s fast-paced problem solving monologues and turns them into a breakneck internal monologue. There’s also a surprise return for a one-off companion, much less irritating than their deployment on television....
I really liked that a lot. What isn’t accidental is Steven Moffat – and this is the first of his three final scripts for Doctor Who – leaving his mark on the show. At one stage, it felt like he was an outgoing head of state, putting in some last minute legislation before the new regime comes in to do with certain facets of the show. World Enough And Time bears a few of his writing hallmarks and recurring ideas....
Cold War Mark Gatiss’ Cold War sees Doctor Who on surer, less risky ground than last week’s The Rings Of Akhaten. Given that the response to The Rings Of Akhaten has been, er, ‘varied’ (culminating in The Sun penning a piece quoting people saying it was the worst episode ever), Cold War is likely to be a lot more unifying. Certainly, amongst the episodes of series 7 (in both its parts) thus far, it’s the one that spans Who fans of different eras the most successfully (the hostile action displacement system!...
9.6 The Woman Who Lived Readers of a certain age may well have indulged in the computer game of The Hobbit once upon a time. It was a text adventure, released in the early 1980s, and I always came a cropper when I happened upon the pale bulbous eyes. You’ll forgive me, then, for shining eyes coming out of the darkness still managing to unnerve me in film and TV shows, and the few moments where The Woman Who Lived opted to creep me out hit pretty much every time....
The second Dollhouse story is called The Target, and starts by trying to fill in some of the chasm-sized narrative blanks that the opening story left. It goes back to a time when Echo’s handler, Boyd Langton, joined the operation, after the death of his predecessor when Alpha went insane and killed three of the other actives, leaving only Echo alive. He also kills her handler and puts the mark of Zorro on Dr....
The first thing that players will notice about Doom is their character’s incredibly fast movement speed, and everything else in the campaign matches that intensity with the meter cranked up to eleven. The enemies themselves are extremely aggressive at all times, from impish creatures that hurl fireballs your way, to giant horned monstrosities that charge you mercilessly across the wide, open maps. Combine this with the adrenaline-pumping heavy metal soundtrack that kicks its way through your speakers during every combat encounter, and Doom’s gameplay becomes a pulse-pounding, head-banging thrill....
Dragon Ball Super Episode 12 For a show that has gone on for as long as Dragon Ball has, and one that delights in introducing the Next Big Strong Super-Threat as soon as the previous one has been vanquished, there’s a natural roadblock: How much stronger can people keep getting? Goku and company are now at a stage in their lives where they’re not only fighting gods, but becoming them. While increasingly strong characters usually just translate to fancy new transformations and overwhelming displays of energy, this episode of Dragon Ball Super begins to explore the consequences of what can happen when two people as strong as Goku and Beerus go head-to-head....
DuckTales Episode 3 More and more I’m delighted by DuckTales commitment to telling character based stories. We not only get Dewey learning more about his mom (so thankfully they aren’t dragging that story out) but just a really funny A plot with Louie desperately trying to get back Scrooge’s dime. On the surface it’s simple but it’s milked for its full comedic potential. Louie’s lazy so Scrooge brings him to work....
3.16 For All You Know This week’s Elementary tapped into a practically unmined seam of dramatic potential in the history of this particular Sherlock Holmes: events during the worst excesses of his addiction. During this period of blackouts, paranoia and hallucinations, what did Holmes miss, and more importantly, whom did he hurt? It was a great hour, one that put Jonny Lee Miller centre stage not as an amusing motor-mouth eccentric, but as a man tortured by his past....
“I’m almost done with my new script,” Roth said. “I was actually almost done with it before ‘Basterds’, but I had to put it down, and that was actually a good thing I took time away from it, but I’m going to finish that up and start shooting this fall.” “I don’t want to say what [the monster is] yet,” Roth continued. “Once it gets set up, I will let everyone know....
You’re getting your first taste of how vocal comics fans are now – is that a factor you have to dismiss in a project like Wolverine in order to follow your own vision? There doesn’t appear to be one definitive backstory to this character; there have been various interpretations and that was a little – given that I confess I did not know the comics well when I was first asked to do the project…I climbed into this and searched for something definitive, and I couldn’t find anything precisely definitive....
The BBC has much to boast about when it comes to new three part drama Exile. For starters, it’s not a remake, adaptation, or import, and – perhaps most importantly of all – nobody wears a bonnet. These things alone should be enough to silence habitual critics of Auntie’s drama scheduling, before we even get to the fact that Exile is very good indeed. The story then. Prodigal son Tom (John Simm) returns to his Lancashire family home after an absence of two decades which, judging by the coke residue left all over his flat and the flashness of his car, he’s spent living a hedonistic London life as a successful hack....
3.1 On Thin Ice Those aliens, called the Volm, are old enemies of the Overlords, also called the Espheni. As the rebel skitters could tell you if they had access to a harnessed kid, this isn’t the first rodeo for the Espheni’s conquest ships. In the seven months since first contact with the Volm, they have proven themselves to be strong allies of the humans, providing awesome blaster weapons, de-harnessing technology, and logistical support....
It’s a story that’s been adapted for the screen by Matt Greenhalgh, under the direction of Paul McGuigan. And the subsequent film proves to be an affectionate, warm, moving picture, about Turner and Grahame’s lives intersecting, with the latter in the apparent twilight of her career, treading the boards in theatre. It’s when she’s on stage one night that she collapses, and puts in a call to Turner, at this stage in his life an actor in his 20s in Liverpool....
I sense from the talkback on the last review that people don’t like me pointing out how shoddy this show can be. So, ahead of seeing this episode I decided this week to try to concentrate on the positive aspects of Scary Monsters And Super Creeps. What did I like? Well, there’s a subplot where Demitri Noh and Al Gough follow some blue hand clues to the people who attacked them, admitting along the way that he’s now entirely bought into the flash concept, something he’s been resisting so far for obvious reasons....
‘It doesn’t matter what I believe’, says Henry Tyson, even as Tavrani continues preparing the tupilaq, ‘people need myths and stories’. Yes Henry, yes they do. Stories are neat. They’re a comfort. They tell us that there’s a beginning, an end and maybe even a baddie and a goodie. We understand stories which is why we make them up when understanding itself proves too difficult. There are several stories on offer in this week’s episode of Fortitude, each offering different levels of comfort but none of which come anywhere close to the truth....
