Feedback: GAVIN & STACEY (series 3)

Young ‘Gavlar’ and Smithy are back, and for me it feels like they have never left. Sure Gavin has moved from Essex to Wales, and the series has made the jump from BBC3 to BBC1, but other than the geographic co-ordinates it all just feels the same.

The characters and the show both seem not to have moved an inch since the last time we saw the gang a year ago. Sure Gavin has a new job and Smithy has no work on the account of the economy, but really do we care about their working lives? No we don’t!

Gavin and Stacey is about family and friends and the emotional soup that comes along with having people in your life that you care about… Sadly for the series, television is about being fresh and exciting, and giving your audience a feeling that you are on a journey to someplace new and exciting. Which is not something I got from the first episode of the new series. I felt more like I had been there and done that, and got the box-set already.The jokes felt recycled, and the mood of the show still had that warm fuzzy feeling about it, like watching home movies of your friend’s funny family.

Of course it was only the first episode, so I will not abandon hope. I will stick it out with my television family of choice and continue on the journey through Gavin and Stacey’s lives. I will watch with anticipation for  those moments that made Gavin and Stacey the biggest sleeper hit in recent BBC memory… And in true family fashion they may disappoint, but I will probably love them all the same despite!

So with my wishy-washy views on the series out of the way, I wonder what the other critics out there thought???…

TRUE BLOOD – the game

So you have watched the series (several times in my case) and read the books, perhaps you have even ordered a case of that Tru Blood drink, and now if you wish you can play True Blood The Game .

Yes folks you can enter the town of Bon Temps and go in search of your sister in True Blood style. Just click the link below and give it a go!

http://fxuk.com/shows/true-blood/game#

TRUE BLOOD the quotes parts 7& 8

In episode 7 of the best Vampire creation of the noughties Bill clears up some of the myths about vampires in this friendly exchange with Sookie:

Sookie Stackhouse: [surprised as Bill wipes off the mirror] Wait a minute. I thought you were supposed to be invisible in the mirror.
Bill Compton: We started most of the myths about ourselves many centuries ago. If humans thought that we couldn’t be seen in a mirror, it was another way for us to prove that we weren’t vampires. And that way, we could stay hid.
Sookie Stackhouse: So, what about holy water?
Bill Compton: [splashing bath water] It’s just water.
Sookie Stackhouse: Crucifixes?
Bill Compton: Geometry.
Sookie Stackhouse: Garlic?
Bill Compton: It’s irritating, but that’s pretty much it.
Sookie Stackhouse: [pause, smiling] Wow. I feel a little weak.
Bill Compton: Of course you do. I fed on your blood. You should take some vitamin B-12 to replenish.
Sookie Stackhouse: Will I need to do that everyday?
Bill Compton: If you don’t mind, yes. And no garlic.

In episode 8 Bill explains to the vampire sheriff Eric, why he should get a Blackberry:

Eric Northman: [after Bill has found him in his bathtub, with soft music playing] I texted you three times. Why didn’t you reply?
Bill Compton: I hate using the number keys to type.

I’M A CELEBRITY… I Gino really Adam Sandler in disguise?

This has really been bothering me since this series of I’m a Celebrity started… Before the series aired I had never heard of Gino D’Acampo, and I can never remember seeing him on the television before. At first I thought perhaps I had just never watched Ready, Steady, Cook since he has appeared on the daytime cooking show. Now I am starting to think that Gino D’Acampo is really just Adam Sandler in disguise because this guy is too funny to be true!

And he is quickly moving up my jungle vine to become my pick to win the show!

Gino D'Acampo

Adam Sandler

I’M A CELEBRITY… Lucy and Katie heading home

• So the pressure got to be too much for Katie Price, or perhaps it was the realisation that most people in the UK don’t really like the publicity hungry minx… Whatever the real reason is, Katie quit the jungle as predicted on this blog yesterday. And not to miss a headline she then announced to the world that she had ended her relationship with her cross-dressing boyfriend Alex.

As much as I enjoyed seeing Katie eat bugs and squeal in fright at the sight of a cup of water, I am glad to see her leave the jungle, now we can focus on some of the other contestants.

• Tonight also saw the first eviction from the jungle and as predicted by myself yesterday, it was Lucy Benjamin who departed first from the jungle.
• The Bushtucker trial was performed by Kim and Joe, who were at each others throats last night. The pair put their differences behind them though and performed very well gaining 9 of 11 meals for camp.
• Tomorrow sees all the contestants going to the public vote for eviction, and for no reason other than that he is boring I predict Jimmy White will be heading out of the jungle.

Faces: ANT & DEC

A long time ago (1990) in a BBC studio two boys met on the set of a teen soap called Byker Grove.

After a bit of a shaky start, the two soon became best friends, and together they took the entertainment world by storm, becoming the most popular presenters working in UK television today. But what else is known of these two cheeky chaps known as Ant & Dec?

Outside the Box scoured the interweb to find out:

Anthony ‘Ant’ McParlin & Declan ‘Dec’ Donnelly fact file:

• Ant: born 18 November 1975 in Newcastle upon Tyne, England.
• Dec: born 25 September 1975 in Newcastle upon Tyne, England.
• Ant: first appeared on television in the children’s workshop programme Why Don’t You.
• Dec: first appeared on television in the BBC children’s drama Byker Grove.
• It was on the set of Byker Grove where Ant and Dec met… That meeting is rumoured to have occurred in a toilet.

• After leaving Byker Grove, Ant and Dec tried their hand at a career in music. They performed using their Byker Grove character names PJ and Duncan.
• The duo never had a UK #1 but they were nominated for a BRIT award for their song Let’s Get Ready To Rhumble.

• During their music career the duo turned their hand to TV presenting on the children’s show Gimme 5.
• In 1995 Ant and Dec brought two shows to television. The BAFTA award winning comedy sketch show The Ant & Dec show which aired on children’s BBC. They also had an evening Channel 4 show Ant & Dec Unzipped which also won a BAFTA.
• After presenting various other BBC programmes such as Friends Like These, the BBC believed the duo had run their course and decided to let them go… (Idiots)!
• ITV quickly snapped up the duo where they initially presented children’s shows such as SMTV Live and CD:UK alongside the gorgeous Cat Deeley.
• After presenting the kids shows the duo subsequently moved to Saturday evenings to present Pop Idol, PokerFace and Ant & Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway.
• Arguably the duos most popular gig is presenting I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!
• In 2006 the duo released an acting project the film Alien Autopsy, the film gained mixed reviews about the storyline but the pair received generally good reviews for their acting abilities.
• In 2006 Ant married his long time girlfriend Lisa Armstrong; guess who is best man was… Of course Dec!
• In 2007, the duo began hosting ITV’s new show, Britain’s Got Talent, featuring Simon Cowell, Amanda Holden and Piers Morgan.
• Ant and Dec have also starred in the children’s TV series Engie Benjy with Dec starring in the title role, and Ant voicing several of the other characters.
• In 2008 the duo went across the pond to present a game show Wanna Bet? which aired on ABC.

Paper Watch: James Corden, Ruth Jones, I’m a Celebrity and more

From The Guardian: The Lush Life of James and Ruth

With the return of Gavin and Stacey for a third and sadly last series The Guardian took a trip to Barry Island to see “what’s occurrin’?” with the stars and writers of one of the best comedy shows of the noughties.

They’re friends and co-writers but around these parts they’re simply Nessa and Smithy, the characters they created and play in Gavin & Stacey, which is filmed here on Barry Island where they’re welcomed back like the homecoming king and queen.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE

From The Telegraph: 100 TV Shows That Defined the Decade

With the noughties drawing to a close many of the newspapers are doing decade reviews. The Telegraph took a look at 100 shows that defined the last ten years. At first I was a bit angry with the rankings but soon I realised this is not a ‘best shows’ list, these are the shows that defined where we are going as a nation. Surely if it was a ‘best of’ list the top five would have looked like this:

1. The Wire
2. The Sopranos
3. Six Feet Under
4. Family Guy
5. Dexter

The two most important television trends of the past 10 years couldn’t be more different. In America, the decade has proved a golden age for drama. Bold, brilliant series such as The West Wing, The Sopranos and The Wire have brought novelistic storytelling and Hollywood production values to the small screen. These groundbreaking, “high-end” dramas were watched in a new way, too: downloaded from the internet, or bought as a DVD box-set, they were viewed “on demand” and helped turn television into an increasingly solitary pastime.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE ARTICLE AND SEE THE FULL LIST

From The Times: Gavin & Stacey’s Joanna Page

The Times features an interview with the wonderful Joanna Page who plays Stacey on the hit BBC show Gavin & Stacey. Reading it I discovered that the actress is not all that different from the character on the show.

Joanna Page talks a lot. Like, a lot, a lot. Ask her a question and she’ll natter on non-stop, possibly without breathing, until you ask her another. So much comes out that some of it gets lost along the way.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL INTERVIEW

From The Times: Caitlin Moran the return of I’m a Celebrity

Without question Caitlin Moran is the best commentator or television. She views and reviews shows in a way that the rest of us could only dream of, and this week she is on top form taking a look at the return of the celebrity jungle adventure that is I’m A Celebrity…

“There’s eels in there.”

Those are words that — as my friend James pointed out — alert celebrities to the fact that their career is going through a rather thin phase. Particularly if, at the time they’re uttered, it’s in proximity to a trapdoor opening on to a 15ft pit, at the bottom of which is your only hope of a meal that day, and Sam Fox — still picking giant spider legs out from between her teeth — is bawling “Gwan, mate! You can do it!” from the sidelines.

Yes, it’s the return of I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! — the show that brings celebrities and eels together, often in the same item of clothing, as demonstrated in the amazing “Eel Trousers” task of 2006. And who is going to be donning the Eel Trousers of 2009? Well, thanks to a series of ferocious tabloid leaks, it was absolutely no surprise at all when the full line-up appeared on the opening show on Sunday.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE