After a few months of not much happening, there's suddenly a few new series that deserve your attention - Spiral, Rubicon and The Walking Dead.
TV reviews including mild peril
After a few months of not much happening, there's suddenly a few new series that deserve your attention - Spiral, Rubicon and The Walking Dead.
Excellent BBC documentary about the history and recent popularity of Scandinavian crime fiction and TV. Beck, Wallander and Salander among others. May disappear soon so watch it asap. Watch on BBC iplayer
For a few years I've been reading Robert Kirkman's comic book The Walking Dead. I'll admit here to not being the greatest fan of the medium, I'm never too sure of the intended pacing of stories compared with novels or movies, and find that expository dialogue, particularly in Kirkman's case, tends to sound unnatural. So even as a long-time zombie enthusiast, I approached the pilot episode with a few reservations.
SKY TV just aired the first episode, titled THORNE:SLEEPYHEAD, in a 3-part adaptation of Mark Billingham’s first novel. David Morrissey fits the bill as the run-down detective Tom Thorne, even if he is too tall and good-looking, and there’s a fine supporting cast including Natasha McElhone, Eddie Marsan and Aidan Gillen. It’s directed by Stephen Hopkins in a strange attempt to film London in the style of 24, but it more or less works and it’s good to see a homegrown drama with decent production values. I’m hoping it’s a success, as Billingham’s Thorne novels are all well-plotted with...
I only started watching Fringe part way through the first season, having initially dismissed it as another X-Files clone. In retrospect, I timed it about right, because that’s about the point it turned from a Monster of the Week show into something with a bit more long-term interest. It’s not an original strategy of course, indeed the X-Files long-term arc about alien invasion tried the same thing before giving up any attempt at coherence, but Fringe does appear to be planning ahead slightly. Perhaps JJ Abrams has learned from his experience on Lost, where the apparent lack of plot...
