Happy New Year!

I didn't post about the final of Strictly. Because, well. Tom? Really? Whatever. The Christmas special was not overly spectacular either. It was lovely to see Alesha and Matthew again and I was very impressed by Jill and Darren.

I suspect next year we'll see a few (or alot) more new professionals as the BBC tries to update the show. Camilla is apparently not coming back anyway, which is a shame. I don't know whether to be excited or worried about next years show. A bit of both I think.


The Christmas telly was all a bit dull and boring. A few highlights: Gavin and Stacy, which my mum loves, and was very funny; the new Jonathan Creek which was very good, though seemed to have alot more actually murder and gore than I every remember. And... that was about it. A really really bad year for Christmas telly overall.


Anyway! It is a new year, and there is new telly to watch. Today I watched the second episode of Demons. I didn't realise it was the second episode until about half way through so I was very confused. Confused and bored. The main characters were incredibly dull, only Simeon and Terry the Driving instructor were watchable. The story was quite good, but it all got a bit confusing and dragged out and then was over with about three strikes of a flaming sword. Which made me wonder why the last guy couldn't manage that. So I probably won't watch that again.

Also: ITV player seems to be an exact copy of the BBC iPlayer. Right down to the logo. How odd.

Results. Somewhat incoherently.

What? WHAT? WHAT? I hate the dancing I hate the dancing I hate the dancing. I've been saying this for weeks. Tonight was much more justified though.

I know that letting people vote when it wouldn't make any difference to result is going to cause a scandal, but for christs sake DO MATHS QUICKER. We worked out what was going to happen before the main show ended; the BBC should have done so to.

I can't believe they let them all through. I can't believe it, when Tom was so much worse in both dances. It wasn't like all three were really close and Tom had had one really good dance, he was far below the standard of Lisa and Rachel, he deserved to be in the dance off. And perhaps he would have done really well and got through anyway.

Of course, they did spend the whole show telling us that it was much more difficult for the men, and that no one remembers that. Well, why would we, it's not as if we are told that over and over and over again by anyone, is it? So the real reason why Tom's marks were so much lower than the others is because he's a man. He should get extra points just to make things fair.

They changed the rules for Baby Spice back in series 4, because the judges loved her and the public refused to vote for her. Urgh.

The BBC needs to make more contingency plans if they are going to continue make tv that is live and involves audience participation. Because that's the sort of tv that goes wrong alot and needs quick and efficent sorting out.

I remember a time when tv wasn't always rubbish. I'm sure it's not just the hazy glowing memory of my childhood, honest.

Strictly Come Dancing: Semi-final

Lisa and Brendan.
Lisa's quickstep dress was very pretty, I liked the black underneath, instead of the mad bright clashing colours we've been getting this year. Her quickstep seemed quite good, though I didn't see most of it.

Her Argentine Tango was good, I agreed that she needed to be a bit more precise and sharp and stuff with all her flicks. It was weird to see the judges treating Brendan almost like a celeb because the dance was new to him too.

Following last week I am back on the 'hating Brendan' train. It's a bit of a relief. (Although we spent some time reminiscing about when Camilla and Brendan stopped being awkward around each other and started being sweet and adorable.)

Rachel and Vincent
Rachel's American smooth was lovely, very soft and flowing, etc. It got a bit dull at times, which does lead me to disagree with Len that there was no foxtrot in it.

There was a lot of pressure on them for the Argentine Tango, but luckily it was as brilliant as it looked in rehersals. Fantastic leg flicks and twisty bits, lots of emotion and passion. Yay Rachel. Rachel to win.

Tom and Camilla
OH GOD TOM. His jive was okay, I really liked the routine, but thought Tom didn't dance it very well a bit too wild and imprecise. I felt bad for Camilla when they went on about her choreography.

Then Tom "acted" his way through the Argentine Tango instead of doing any steps. Interestingly, if memory serves me correctly was the same critism they made of Gethin last year. Either Camilla is trying to choreography her own A.Ts, or whoever choreographs them for her needs firing. But oh God the "acting." I am looking at my watch. I have a serious face on. STOP IT.

Luckily Tom will defiantely be in the dance off therefore, unless the other person messes up completely, will go home. (Yay maths!) It's sad for Camilla, but she deserves to get to the final with someone lovely.

Erin was in the audience. With the common people. What was that all about? This means she is not going to be dancing in the LIVE results show. It seems that she and Austin aren't even going to be in the Christmas special.

The LIVE results show will be on soon. See how much more interested I am in Strictly when there is a LIVE results show coming up? LIVE RESULTS SHOW.

Pre-Strictly Post

We are having the results show LIVE. As in TONIGHT. Caps lock does not fully express my joy. Actually it's good I'm excited about it, because I'm not very excited about any of the dancers. Hmm.

I've been watching Series 3 at my computer while I finish making Christmas presents. (My desk is currently a mess of wool, beads, thread, needles and bits of wire.) Darren wasn't joking this week when he said you used to have to really work for tens. Also, Len does have a 5! And a 6. Or he did once, anyway.

Also, I love Colin&Erin.

Strictly Come Dancing: Week 12 and Results

I'm devestated to see Austin and Erin leave on Sunday. Poor Erin yesterday, who'd ever think she'd actually cry on TV? Weird and sad. :( Part of me is worried that she's not planning on coming back next year and in fact is going to get married and have children instead. Of course there is speculation that the producers are so pleased with the new pros, that some of the older pros might not be asked back next year.

So we are left with Rachel - good but bland, Tom - managing to be both dull and annoing, and Lisa, who is alright, but is partnered with Brendan who showed us this weekend that the whole reformed act was just an act. And to think he fooled me into thinking he had turned into a decent guy. On balance I think I'd like Rachel to win. She seems the best and I like Vincent.

But overall, I've found this series has been very disappointing. Lots of very uninteresting celebrities, for some reason. I think they've stretched it out too long as well. Sigh. I'm already speculating which celebs we could have next year.

Strictly Week 11, plus other telly.

Sorry for the lack of posts. We are currently in the middle of a major roof-and-windows replacement which has become a bit of a nightmare. I still have internet, but it's all a bit disheartening. I've been sleeping on the sofa bed downstairs for a week, and it looks like it'll be another week before I can get back into my bedroom.

The other problem is that the current contestents on Strictly seem all a bit... bland. Thank god for Austin and Erin's paso, which had some energy to it! Everyone else is good, but a bit dull; Arlene really shouldn't have tried to compared Rachel to Alesha, because, basically, hell no. Alesha was exciting and energetic, she had such presence on the dance floor, and no one this series is living up to that consistantly. There have been a couple of dances that did, but largely I think there is a lack of engery and excitment. I did enjoy Lisa and Brendan's dances, Brendan has had a fairly massive change of attitude this year and I'm starting to (gulp) almost like him. Almost.

Anyway.

Last night I watched new comedy show "Beehive." Which was possibly the weirdest tv show in a long time. I enjoyed it, for the most part (minus the vomiting section,) but it wasn't exactly laugh out loud stuff. I liked the parts were they were being themselves, rather than dressed up. The first sex in the city sketch was good, the second one had vomiting, and I think anymore are going to get less funny over time. I laughed at the spiderman bit. So, enjoyable if not exactly funny, and I will probably try and remember to watch again.

I've also been rewatching series 1 and 2 of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and being amused-slash-horrified that a)Star Trek manages to illustrate moral ambiguity with more subtley than any current TV shows I watch. (Seriously Star Trek. WTF?) and b) that a generation are growing up thinking that NewWho is how you write scifi. In twenty years time we are either going to have awful scifi shows written by children who watching Doctor Who and write like that, or we are going to have good scifi shows written by children who watching NewWho and went I can write better than that.

Fingers crossed.

(This is probably the one and only mention NewWho will get on this blog.)

Strictly Come Dancing: Week 10

Real Life kept me away from this blog, during the week of excitment and adventure. Or something. I was very sad to see Cherie go last week, though it was a fair decision, and it was a shame John Sergent decided to leave, but I'm not sad to see the back of the endless debates, arguements etc etc.

Moving on.

This week felt quite exciting, more so than last week, which felt a bit of a let down dancewise. Jodie managed a latin dance! I'm very impressed. I enjoyed it alot, though I agree with Craig that it needed a few more basic steps.

I didn't like Christine's chacha at all, it felt awkward, and she lost her footing constantly. Her overperformance in her top half only emphasised the footwork she was lacking. I agreed with Arlene - the performance was there, the steps were not.

Lisa's dance was apparently unmemorable. What did she do? Oh, a quickstep. It was not too bad, it didn't quite have the lovely gliding that other quicksteps we've seen have had. It also felt a bit too slow, mostly at the begining.

Tom and Camilla danced a decent tango, nothing too special, but he did seem to be really taking charge, even though he was leading poor Camilla about by the arm!

Rachel's foxtrot was lovely, possibly not 40/40 lovely though. I prefered her rumba last week, which was smashing. But she did manage to impress me with a Foxtrot, that famously boring dance, so well done her.

Austin and Erin's chacha was brilliant, really entertaining. I actually sucumbed to voting for them, because they are in a dangerous position and I think they deserve to stay.

(Randomly, I ended up speaking to Austin's aunt in the Post Office queue this week. It was a fascinating, though somewhat bizarre, twenty minutes.)

I'd quite like Lisa or Christine to go, but I've no idea which way the public will vote. I think Austin might end up in the dance off.

The judges bickering. Oh god, I hate Len. I HATE LEN. He thinks his opinion is the best and we should just ignore those two over there. Good on Craig for intertupting him for once I say, and absolutely spot on with Len offering useless advice. URGH. He'll come on ITT next week and be all 'oh, we have four judges for four different opinions and of course we'll disagree sometimes,' ignoring the fact that he is just rude and disrespectful of those different opinions and and and URGH.

Also, Bruce gets worse and worse.