It's Television: Dissected
TV News, Reviews and Interviews
All singing! All dancing! Repeated sax offender Wilbur Wilde is our guest co-host, aussietheatre.com‘s Anne-Marie Peard talks about TV shows that sing (warning: Buffy), we review season 2 of HBO’s Flight Of The Conchords, reminisce about Aussie rock shows and Josh Kinal shows his mad teleportation skills. Oddly, no-one mentions Sweet & Sour (except here).
Contact us by sending us email or send us an SMS on 0458 288 837 (0458 CUTTER)
James Talia joins us to talk about the way television news covered the Victorian bushfires and we look at the new Joss Whedon show, Dollhouse.
There’s also some letters to Boxcutters and all the news we could fit into the rest of the show. It’s good. Listen to it.
Contact us by sending us email or send us an SMS on 0458 288 837 (0458 CUTTER)
Things we mention:
The United States of Tara is a new show from Showtime in the US starring Australia’s Own Toni Collette. We also bring you an I Don’t Buy It about mobile phone clubs and a Ray Watch about Sunday Night.
Listen to the show the rest of the media is all a-buzz about:
Contact us by sending us email or send us an SMS on 0458 288 837 (0458 CUTTER)
Write a letter to the Green Guide talking about loving/hating/cooking Boxcutters.
Wil Anderson joins us to talk about the Gruen Transfer, The Glass House and iced confection. Also, we review the new show Privileged and read out a whole heap of letters.
Contact us by sending us email or send us an SMS on 0458 288 837 (0458 CUTTER)
courtesy of Actual Chad
Editor of shows including Mythbusters and Bondi Rescue, Rob Buttery joins us to talk about the world of television editing.
We do a review of the US show Eleventh Hour and a Before & After School about Count Duckula.
You know you want it:
Contact us by sending us email or send us an SMS on 0458 288 837 (0458 CUTTER)
Earlier this week I sat down to watch the first episode of Underbelly: A Tale of Two Cities.
What I found was a disappointing display of potential that had been dashed upon the rocks of Australian commercial television.
In the first episode we’ve got two main characters, Robert Trimbole (played by the excellent Roy Billing) and Terry Clark (who looks a lot like Matthew Newton with a moustache).
These could be complex characters but they seem to be whittled down to a couple of key phrases including: “Don’t you cross me” and “Where’s my money?” The latter of which can be really interesting as in the paper boy from Better Off Dead but in this case just comes across as one-dimensional.
The main problem is that the story-telling is so rushed we aren’t given the opportunity to get emotionally invested in any of the characters . So we have no reason to keep watching because we really don’t care if they live or die (and they are most likely going to die).
There also seems to be a rule that a random woman must show her breasts every 12 minutes or people will turn off.
I find the whole thing condescending and a little bit boring which is disappointing because we really could have some great television here. The stories themselves, told by somebody who cares, are fascinating and exciting. Unfortunately here it’s like they’re told by someone who not only doesn’t care, but also wants to get away from you as soon as possible.
Underbelly 2: A Tale of Two Cities airs on Monday nights at 9:30 on Nine.
Gillian Bartlett and Donna Lyon from Bam Boom! Entertainment join us to talk about their very unique television jobs. Also there’s a review of the new Underbelly season premier, and the new US show Lie to Me. Also we look at coverage of the Victorian bushfires in a special Raywatch.
Get it:
Contact us by skadding us email or send us an SMS on 0458 288 837 (0458 CUTTER)
Due to the nature of our arrangement with 3RRR, the best radio station in the world, we sometimes have to give up our spot in the studio so that they can train new people to make more excellent radio.
As such, we’ll record Episode 168 on Tuesday and it will be available on Tuesday night.
To make this fair to everybody, we’ll record Episode 169 on Sunday. One day late, one day early, and it all evens up in the wash.
Sorry for the late notice.
Noted local author of vampire novels, Narrelle M. Harris joins us to talk about the world of the vampire in television. We cover the UK drama Demons. A listener sent in an I Don’t Buy It and we create the word “Skad”.
Skad this:
Contact us by skadding us email or send us an SMS on 0458 288 837 (0458 CUTTER)
People using IE7 have reported to us that they’ve had issues using the Disqus commenting system. Until we can fix this, we’ll be turning Disqus off but leaving comments open.
This means that we won’t have any threaded comments but you will be able to comment more easily.
Sorry for the inconvenience this has or will cause.
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