|
Post by andydecker on Jan 17, 2013 19:03:54 GMT
You'll also be delighted to know that NBC are making a Dracula TV series. Yes, I am thrilled I thought not bad. I like Rhys Meyers, I like Downton Abbey. So what can go wrong? Everything seems to be going according to plan... until he becomes infatuated with a woman who appears to be a reincarnation of his dead wife. And already they fuck it up. I loathed this idiotic, stupid, hare-brained, unneccesary plot in Bram Stoker's Dracula, which made a potential great horror-movie into a cringe-worthy romcom. And joy, now we get again, only longer. Why is it so difficult to make a decent Dracula?
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Jan 20, 2013 19:57:43 GMT
Never mind your Dracula's and Penny Dreadfuls! Forthcoming Midsomer Murder episode Schooled in Murder - which, apparently, begins with the crushing to death of a dairy worker under an enormous slab of cheese - will be D.S. Ben 'Cosmo' Jones last, as Jason Hughes, our final link to the John Nettles era, is quitting the show, although he may return for the occasional special guest appearance. Midsomer just won't be the same bed of vice, corruption and mass murder without him. Here's young Stella Harris at the close of 'sixties Brit horror classic Death And The Diva to soften the blow. Meanwhile, back on Ripper Street, last week's vomit-drenched episode saw a madman, jealous of Jack the Ripper's notoriety, set about the indiscriminate poisoning of Londoners. Among the stricken, Emily, DI Reid's saintly wife who loves all the little poor women even if they are pox-ridden harlots. As Emily nears death, her husband discovers his inner Gene Hunt and tortures the culprit for the antidote. Not that it matters a jot but Ripper Street still strikes me as an almighty mess; just as we're coming to terms with the show's take on 1889, a raid on the local transvestite hang-out lands us bang in the middle of a ropey New Romantic pop video, and the dialogue is impossible at times, like the scriptwriter opted to slang things up with a last minute raid on the glossary of Kellow Chesney's The Victorian Underworld. But somehow it works, and tonight it seems, we'll be paying a visit to Bedlam.
|
|
|
Post by David A. Riley on Jan 20, 2013 20:41:39 GMT
Great summing up of Ripper Street. I keep watching it but wish it were better. Sometimes the dialogue - and its delivery - have me glad I don't have any bricks handy to hurl at the TV.
Have you had a chance to watch the new serial, Utopia? I watched it on catch up last night. It's possibly the oddest, nastiest bit of TV I've seen for a long time. I have a feeling it will grow on me. At least I hope so. Hard to tell from the first 90 minute episode, but it could be rivetting.
|
|
|
Post by Dr Terror on Jan 20, 2013 20:53:51 GMT
Did anyone else notice in last week's Ripper Street the scratches on the other Inspector's face changed sides?
|
|
|
Post by killercrab on Jan 21, 2013 3:04:23 GMT
But somehow it works, and tonight it seems, we'll be paying a visit to Bedlam.
After being underwhelmed by the first two episodes - I thought the cholera/poisoning story was excellent entertainment with a couple of dry gags to make you smile amidst the vomit. Am now looking forward to watching the Bedlam story!
KC
|
|
|
Post by andydecker on Jan 21, 2013 8:58:51 GMT
Among the stricken, Emily, DI Reid's saintly wife who loves all the little poor women even if they are pox-ridden harlots. As Emily nears death, her husband discovers his inner Gene Hunt and tortures the culprit for the antidote. Wasn't this the rule in victorian times anyway, this and a trip to Australia? I love this poison/antidote plots. After a sip they are again right as rain, never mind the liquified innards. No Jones is sad though. I liked him. Wonder who will be next? A woman? Or one of the guys of Strike Back who are curently unemployed?
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Jan 21, 2013 10:43:43 GMT
Have you had a chance to watch the new serial, Utopia? I watched it on catch up last night. It's possibly the oddest, nastiest bit of TV I've seen for a long time. I have a feeling it will grow on me. At least I hope so. Hard to tell from the first 90 minute episode, but it could be rivetting. That first episode of Utopia was seriously nasty, and the eyeball torture scene as excruciating to watch as the pre-reviews suggested. Imagine how supremely disturbing it would be if it simply ended on "I'm Jessica Hyde", no explanation, no series, no nothing? Last nights Ripper Street was .... well, the more I see, the more I think we've a gaudy 2013 equivalent of similarly unintelligible but brilliant early 'eighties mini-series, The Borgias. The construction of the London underground and its attendant slum clearance provides opportunity for the ethnic cleansing of Whitechapel's teeming pauper hordes. Mr. Bones, the public face of the railway, is under pressure to deliver on time - miss a deadline and funding will be stopped with immediate effect - and it's all starting to tell on him. Worse, Best, the sleazy hack from The Star who reputedly penned the "From Hell" letter, has been researching Bones background for skeletons. Little surprise that Reid and his men soon have a related double murder to investigate, the second perpetuated by none other than Long Susan (an absolutely ludicrous creation, mixing it in all the worst dives without once getting mugged then back to a brothel so lavish it would put the Dorchester to shame). Lucy, a tragic prostitute of Hollyoaks pedigree, is so traumatised at what she witnessed - her mother was killed in front of her before Lady Fishnet slit the throat of the bailiff responsible (and took a bullet in her arse for her troubles) - that Reid can get no sense from her, so she's ushered off to Lark House Asylum by kindly old Dr Crabb, the brilliant psychiatrist and a wolf in philanthropist clothing if ever was. It was he who cured Bones of his epilepsy with some seriously brilliant speed and, due a monster pay off from the ongoing slum clearance, he'll not risk this pregnant tart Lucy opening her mouth about her fancy man's previous bastards who disappeared in mysterious circumstances. "We cannot build a railway without that we demolish a slum or two", he reminds Bones, who cravenly abandons his loved one to a lobotomy for the "common good". That Ripper Street is a BBC America production probably explains why it thinks its a Western. But it's easy to be a smug bastard and pick holes in it, and I hate that kind of thing so I'm gonna shut up about it now.
|
|
|
Post by David A. Riley on Jan 21, 2013 11:36:26 GMT
Being forewarned, and watching it on catch up, I squeamishly fast forwarded through the eye torture scene in Utopia. No apologies. I must admit I'm not into torture porn or anything similar. I enjoyed the rest of this bizarre show, though. Just hope all the mystery lives up to it when we find out what's going on in the end - if we ever actually do.
|
|
|
Post by David A. Riley on Jan 21, 2013 11:55:08 GMT
My problem when watching Ripper Street is that DI Reid keeps reminding me of Harry H. Corbett's Detective Sergeant Bung in Carry On Screaming - and then thinking how much more entertaining it would be if I was watching it!
|
|
|
Post by Dr Terror on Jan 21, 2013 12:27:26 GMT
I keep expecting Reid to start advertising M&S.
|
|
|
Post by andydecker on Jan 21, 2013 13:12:26 GMT
Frankly can't wait to see Ripper Street. Sounds like I would like it a lot. Currently I am watching American Horror Story Asylum. This is also so over top all seams are groaning. And the kitchen sink approach to horror also is admittedly a bit much at times. I mean, you have an american asylum in 1964 run by a sadistic nun, a lesbian reporter getting caught snooping around and submitted to electroshock to see the error of her ways, a serial-killer, a nazi-doctor doing experiments in said asylum and now a demonic possession. Not mention a second storyline playing in the present where there is a cult of the serial-killer hunting people in the now ruins of the asylum. It doesn't make much sense, still it makes great watching. david: the resemblance is uncanny. Like father and son.
|
|
|
Post by Dr Strange on Jan 21, 2013 14:20:48 GMT
My problem when watching Ripper Street is that DI Reid keeps reminding me of Harry H. Corbett's Detective Sergeant Bung in Carry On ScreamingYeah, I got that too! Some howlers in last night's episode - when the entrepreneur was demonstrating the electrified rail, didn't he lift the iron bar off the rails before turning off the power?
|
|
|
Post by Jojo Lapin X on Jan 21, 2013 18:32:34 GMT
That first episode of Utopia was seriously nasty, and the eyeball torture scene as excruciating to watch as the pre-reviews suggested. Imagine how supremely disturbing it would be if it simply ended on "I'm Jessica Hyde", no explanation, no series, no nothing? UTOPIA is very promising! And for fans of eye violence, it contains a rather literate reference to Jerzy Kosinski's THE PAINTED BIRD.
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Jan 28, 2013 9:43:29 GMT
Back on Ripper Street and it's Sergeant Bennet Drake (Jermome Flynn)'s turn under the spotlight in probably the most sensible episode to date. He's fallen for Rose, the prostitute with a lovely parasol and one of Lady Fishnet's biggest earners (her clientèle include Captain Homer Jackson, H. Division's brilliant if debauched pet American pathologist, who tries persuade Rose that her mistress is happy for him to run up a tab and "Isn't mine the most honest face you've ever sat on?"). Also, Madoc Forster, Drake's Colonel from bloody India campaign days, has arrived in Whitechapel a dangerous and embittered man. Those soldiers who fought so gallantly in that barbaric conflict have returned home to abject poverty. Homeless and starving, they are as like to be arrested for vagrancy as find work and shelter. Consequently, Forster is no fan of Queen and Country and lets DI Reid know as much during their initial meeting. Together with a number of his troops, Forster has conducted a series of daring armed robberies as warm up for an attempt on the Royal Mint. Drake, who we learn was a fearsome butcher of the battlefield, has divided loyalties and, after Reid imposes on him to beat up a sweary suspect in the cells (played by Sam Hazledine, Cully Barnaby's rock manager husband in Midsomer Murders), the lovesick sarge throws in his lot with the rebel army - or does he? Could be that we're growing more accustomed to Rip. Street speak, but the dialogue seemed a little easier on the ear this time around, even if some of it sounds more fake Medieval than fake Victorian.
|
|
|
Post by Dr Strange on Jan 28, 2013 16:35:19 GMT
Yeah - some of the Colonel's monologues were a bit over the top, but all in all an enjoyable episode. I was surprised to see a pump-action shotgun getting an outing, but it turns out they've been around since the 1890s.
|
|