The Cutprice Guignol

The Ninth Year: The Haunting of Swill House
April 14, 2013

Doctor Who: Tension And Rubbish Skaldak In Submarine

So I was wrong. And I was gutted. I wanted the Sea Devils so much that it cast a shadow over an otherwise very decent episode. Ice Warriors? Pfffffffft. I-sorry-iors more like.

Spewed forth from the genius pen of Mark Gatiss (incidentally, for anyone who hasn’t seen League of Gentlemen and incidentally has a very strong stomach for very dark comedy, I’d recommend it heartily), this episode was set against the wonderfully claustrophobic of a nuclear submarine-think Das Boot meets The Thing but in British teatime television format. It was, with no doubt, the weakest episode of the series so far-a complete damn cop-out of a third act saw to that-but that’s not to say Cold War didn’t have it’s warmer moments.

Game of Thrones alumni Liam Cunningham really got his ‘tache around the role of a u-boat captain with a deadly cargo. Another one of those real thesps who just seem to fall into roles in Doctor Who, the part isn’t particularly subtle or nuanced, but doesn’t need to be- he’s got the appropriate gravitas and urgency for the role, and that’s fine. Matt Smith continues the performance in a slightly darker vein- I couldn’t help but notice the lighting this week, often casting him half in shadow, half in light- I am a media student bastard so I desperately want this to mean something, but it probably doesn’t. Whatever, Smith did himself proud against the adversity of the questionable script, and Clara-facing her first real alien- also continued her streak of being both rather good and especially pretty.

Gatiss is a passionate horror fan, and this is palpable throughout his forty minutes-the whole John Carpenter fellatio aside, this episode had a lot of genuinely tense moments. The choice not to show the Ice Warrior (Skaldak, by the way)  till the third act was a good one, especially considering it looked like a scaly turd with teeth and it was a whole lot less scary once you’d clapped eyes on it. Seriously. They must have blown all their special effects and prosthetic budget last week, and it bloody well showed.

But then-BAM!-the third act turned the  whole thing on it’s head, just when it was reaching a wonderful emotional crescendo. This isn’t League of Gentlemen, Gatiss; you can’t just have outsiders turn up and make everything better. That said, I can’t wait-and I mean, can’t wait- for next week. No sea devils, but definitely ghosts. Hurrah! On a side note, the way the Tardis in the opening credits opened up onto the first scene was fucking awful. I’ll have you yet, Moffat.

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April 11, 2013

The Great British Television Revival

Britain, eh? Just sitting there, in the middle of the sea, getting the craic. My home and native land. What may not strike you about this teeny little craggy island drifting about like a philosophy student is that it’s television has suddenly become….well, very British.

You can’t click on anything on BBC iPlayer just now without being faced with some gurning “quintessentially British” personality or other fronting another show prefixed with “THE GREAT BRITISH” *insert seemingly arbitary activity here*. The Great British Bake-Off. Great British Railway Journeys. The Great British Sewing Bee, for Christ’s sake. Victoria Wood, grandmother of all British female comedians, can currently be found peering coyly out from the front page of iPlayer presenting a show about tea. The final of The Great British Bake-Off last season was watched by 6,743,000 people-just to put that in perspective, more people tuned in to watch Paul Hollywood make accidental double entendres about buns than live in the country of my birth. That’s mad, but also kind of understandable; I’d rather watch people baking than live in Orkney. It’s not just over here, either- Doctor Who, the gleaming jewel in the crown of the BBC’s schedule that’s celebrating it’s fiftieth anniversary this year, has been regularly broadcast in 48 countries-that’s means pretty much one in four countries in the entire world enjoying the exploits of a space cowboy with a light-up dildo.

So what’s brought this on? Well, we’ve got the obvious patriotic nonsense that’s we’ve been fish-slapped with over the last year-the Olympics, the Jubilee, the impending birth of a royal sprog. The whole year has been spent trying really, really hard not to talk about the Good Old Days-Christ, I’m surprised the Spice Girls weren’t strapped to a taxi emblazoned with “THE SUN NEVER SETS ON THE GREAT BRITISH EMPIRE”. As a nation, the BBC wants to think that we’re shakily saluting the flag with our eyes glistening with tears, and it’s reflected in their dredging up of every British insitution-cookery, industry, Stephen Fry- while we still care. And you know what? I’m alright with it.

Bloody hell. Anyway, next time: lols.

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April 9, 2013

Doctor Who: Terrifying Aliens Reasonably Discuss Infant Sacrifice

Several things have filled me with joy in recent days. Picking flowers after lectures like a bollocks Jane Austen character, wearing my hipster-vacumn-inducing pinstriped trousers that make me feel like a Sultan in public, eating crisps in bed. But none have filled me with more joy than Saturday’s episode of Doctor Who.

As I mentioned previously, these first few episodes are  about establishing the role of the assistant. Rose was the Doctor’s moral compass, Donna was his mother figure, Amy was the girl who waited (to start acting), and Martha was….well, moderately attractive, I guess. And in The Rings of Unspellable, Clara set herself up as all of the above and more; Jenna Louise-Coleman (who I find myself falling further and further in love with every time she’s on screen) power-acted her way through being charmingly guileless, kick-arsingly ballsy, tenderly maternal and bloody gorgeous within the space of forty minutes. I am sold on her, and I like it.

There was a lot to recommend this episode- the wonderful prosthetics,  the song that the plot hinged on, the special effects good enough wiping every memory of the Tardis pulling what was essentially a poo vaguely shaped like the Titanic through space- and all this was enough to negate the rather flimsy plot. But Matt Smit out acted- well, everyone on television, I’d wager. His climatic scene-facing off against a God who feasted on stories-featured one of the most jaw-droppingly audacious and powerful scenes I’ve scene on Doctor Who in years. It could easily have been cheesy or cheap or childish, but Matt Smith nailed it- and I mean, he nailed it. We’re so used to him being the kiddy, slapstick  Doctor, but here he transformed completely, lines on his face standing out, replacing his mid-twenties charm with year upon year of bitterness and loss and betrayal. Backed by the breathtaking climax of the Murray Gold score, it really was a joy to behold.

Most excitingly, though-and this is purely speculation, but I’m calling it now- it looks like the Sea Devils might possibly be back next week. The fucking sea devils! Do you know how long I’ve waited? Those vaguely flatulent aquatic footsteps have haunted my nightmares for years. For years. Please, PLEASE. Either way, the twisted mind of the delicious Mark Gatiss spewed forth next week’s offerings, so I’ll be there with bells-and rings-on.

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April 2, 2013

A Wanker’s Literary Reaction: Skins

I finally watched Skins yesterday. Apparently a sublime comment on the yoof culture of drugs, sex, tits and booze, the series spanned from 2007 till…well, now, really, with a three-part special due for release later this year. Written by a father-son writing team for E4, it kick-started the careers of Nicholas Hoult and no-one else and remains to this day one of the more popular teenage shows Channel 4 has scattergunned into existence.

Nicholas Hoult is actually really rather good as Tony Stonem, mainly because I find him so monstrously attractive (those eyes. THOSE EY-), but the entire first generation was undermined by the inclusion of Cassie. Now, I have to make it bloody clear that I have nothing against people with any kind of mental health disorder. My issue with Cassie is the utterly awful performance (sorry, Hannah Murray, you seem quite lovely) and the fact she’s been written to seemingly test my nerves as much as possible. She often reaches a rolling rhythm of breathy”wow”s in one sentence, so I suggest forcing a piece of glass into your foot when you here the first one. Your screams of agony will be preferable to this, trust me. The second generation was tighter, across the board; in particular, JJ, played with awkward charm by Olli Barbieri, was superb. Although I don’t really get the attraction to Cook-he’s played to perfection by a carnivorous Jack O’Connell, supposedly some sort of roguish charm not dissimilar to Tony Stonem, but he comes off as a massive wanker with only his own interests and cock at heart. Believe me, I know the signs.

I thought the adult cast were unprecendently and undeservingly good-particularly Danny Dyer, who was actually excellent as a dense-but-well-meaning trophy boyfriend. Mackenzie Crook was sort of great as an imposing gangster, once I got the image of Gareth from The Office reciting ways to kill a man out of my head, and Bill Bailey is pleasantly sweary in an affable, beardy kind of way. They bounce of the younger cast and often make them look a hell of a lot better.

Fuck me, though-I expected a merry cavalcade of sexual experimentation, rampant drug abuse and pretty faces. Little did I know the damn thing’s about as good-natured as dental surgery by a drunken Ian McShane. I didn’t even get onto series 5, so utterly depressed was I by the viscous murder by fucking baseball bat at the end of series 4. When they did the whole death-of-a-lead-character thing in series 2, at least they killed off a character with some background for it, having put the poor boy through the mincer in every emotional, financial and physical sense anyway. Finish him off and put him out of his misery, I say.

Another thing that depressed me about the show was how little it resembled my life or the lives of pretty much anyone I had known that well. For the lucky few, I suppose this kind of debauchery just happens and you all prance around flashing your boobs at people with a joint hanging out of the corner of your mouth. For the rest of us, life’s not dissimilar to a celebrity autobiography at the back of a charity shop- quiet, irrelevant and occasionally getting fingered by ugly mouth-breathers.   Hurrah for youth.

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March 31, 2013

Talent and Relative Decency In Space

I’m angry just now. This is mostly due to the fact I slept in the most comfortable bed in the world last night: not only did it have the consistency of a cloud wrapped in a condom of love, but it had enough room to fit both me and one other full-sized human in it without one of them, say, waking up to find her boyfriend has rolled completely on top of her in his sleep and all unconscious six-five of him is now planking on her. Just hypothetically. And by the end of the night I had become quite emotionally attached to the bed; we weren’t thinking long long term but I had invited it to move in at the end of April. When I was made aware that I couldn’t live here till I died fat and happy years down the line, I was not best pleased. And now I’m back home, in my bed, feeling like I’m nipple-deep in dirty needles and Aberdonians. And furious.

I feel very similar  in fact, to the way I felt at the start of the last few Doctor Who seasons. I thought Freema Aygeman was a disgrace, Matt Smith was far too young to play the Doctor, and David Tennant wasn’t (swoon) Christopher Ecclestone. Something just wasn’t right. But, hand-on-heart, I loved this seasons rollicking opener, The Bells of Saint John.

Introducing the new assistant Clara Osmond, played by sexy Bambi Jenna-Louise Coleman, this episode focuses on something dodgy in the Wi-Fi  in a Black-Mirror-style techno kiddy thriller. I mean none of that in the disparaging sense; I found, for the first time in years, a few scenes to be genuinely tense, mostly due to a fabulously pinched Celia Imrie basking in the delight of a classically villainous Milf-from-hell role. And I’ve never liked any assistant straight off the bat except Billie Piper, but Coleman was surprisingly inoffensive  which is exactly what she needs to be right now. Let the Doctor do his thing and show off while the assistant gasps away and is alternately maternal and spunky-plenty of time to characterize  her later.

Shout out to a supremely entertaining script from Stephen Moffat aided by some cracking direction from Colm McCarthy-this episode set a gold standard that, with two episodes penned by Mark Gatiss and one by legendary Neil Gaiman coming up in the next few weeks, looks set to be continued. But tonight wasn’t about what was to come in the rest of the series; it was tea-time self-contained adventure that was all nicely resolved in forty-eight minutes- clapping-my-hands-together-and bouncing-up-and-down throwaway reference to U.N.I.T the icing of the Tardis . It was, in short, Doctor Who at it’s best. Apart from their continuing bastardization of the theme song. I’ll have you yet, Moffat.

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March 27, 2013

If I Were Stephen Moffat

You know about the new series of that BBC rip-off of the  Time Traveler’s Wife, yeah? That one with that pseudo-fun science teacher we all had in high school running about with his dildo torch? But once he was Hamlet and before that he had big ears (no, like, really big)? Aye, Doctor Who or something. Well, this Saturday it’s back. Despite my cunningly nonchalant air, I am borderline gnawing my own face and those of people around me with excitement.  And I have some suggestions for Stephen Moffat, the lead writer and generally Mafia Don of the show. So, Stephen, if you’re listening (and you best be doing whatever I tell you after the Fiji affair), lick your nib and sit attentively. 

1. No More River Song

There comes a time when people gather together. People of every class, every colour, every creed,  bind together as an unoppresible, silent army against some monolithic enemy, and they take a stand. An unstoppable force meets an immovable object. And sometimes all it needs is one voice, one single voice against the darkness to make a difference, to hold their own against what might be Hell itself. And that voice says “ENOUGH.”

Seriously, Stephen. Get your head out of your arse. I was bored of her by the third episode.

2. The bloody Ood.

If you bring back the Ood, I will forfeit my Whovianship. Now, now, Stephen, stop crying- I know it seems harsh for a big shot télévisioñ critic like myself to threaten you so. But you’ve done well the last few seasons (aside from fucking up the Angels. I don’t care how many violent arguments I have about it, I never wanted to see them move), so if you bring back the less criminally and more a-convincing-argument-for-capital-punishment-lly overused Ood I will see no reason to continue watching your show. Though, I’ll admit the name is pretty fun to say. Ood. Ood. Oooooood.

3. I want the Master back.

You could find a loophole into heaven, Moffat, don’t say you couldn’t, and I want the Master back. Not the magnificent John Simm, obviously, but no-one else can stand in for the Doctor’s real nemesis. I have a few suggestions, too: Benedict Cumberbatch would be great but almost too obvious, so I put forward Jeremy Clarkson or Neil Patrick Harris, or maybe my brother. He’s pretty tall.

So, that’s what I’d do. If I were Stephen Moffat. Which I’m not. I’m just his next regeneration.  Do do dooo……

 

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March 20, 2013

Murphchuck and Horror Stories

I’ve just finished watching the entire series of American Horror Story. I’m deeply skeptical about horror TV shows, usually, because tension is difficult enough to maintain over an hour and a half movie, let alone a ten-part serial. And I was even more deeply skeptical when I discovered that the makers of Glee, Ryan Murphy and Brad Flachuck, (Murphchuck?) were the brains behind the piece. Apropos to nothing, the title also looks like a placeholder name the schedulers forgot to change before release. And this didn’t fill me with faith either.

The first series is set in the “Murder House”- a house with a horrific history that is revealed bit by gruesome bit- the story focusing on the Harmons, the new owners, and their relationship with the houses questionable past occupants and their new neighbors, the Langdons. The cast wavers between decent and utterly superb- a particular nod to Jessica Lange as the Southern-Belle-from-Hell Constance Langdon, a soaring psycho bitch with just the right balance of sugared sarcasm and genuine threat. Zachary Quinto and Teddy Sears remain my favourite duo, the fabulously catty Quinto and alpha-gay Sears playing a heart-wrenching couple coming apart at the seams but trapped in a dysfunctional relationship when the horror of the house takes hold. Most of the main parts are thankless but solid- that said, I love Evan Peters as Tate Langdon, the last word in gorgeous teen hearthrob madmen. Though every time I look directly at him, my eyes ache a little with his beauty, making it difficult to properly judge his performance.

What really sold me on the first series was the gleeful way it ascribed to all the old horror archetypes-the haunted house, scores of creepy children, the mysterious backstories and Something in the Basement. But the writing is solid and throws in handfuls of black humour to keep the show properly entertaning, and the Charlie Clouster (SAW YEAH SAW!) theme is simply superb. All in all, it’s an outstanding season with a satisfyingly chilling payoff.

The second season is, bravely, completely unrelated to the first, set in an asylum in the 1960s. It’s literally impossible to even give a comprehensive outline of the plot without peppering it with spoilers, but suffice to say someone ends up wrongly imprisoned in the deeply questionable Briarcliff Mental Institute. Much of the cast returned for this series, with Jessica Lange and Zachary Quinto being the stand-outs once again, with Quinto getting a much meatier, much darker, much more understated role that he absolutely nails (perhaps an unfortunate choice of words). Bizarelly, Chloe Sevigny pops up playing a irresistible nymphomaniac who suffers a terrible fate at the hands of the deranged Doctor Arden (a patchy but screen-dominating James Cromwell). I can’t honestly say I enjoyed the second second series as much as the first, as I was far more interested in Quinto’s Oliver Thresdon than the writers seemed to be. But I’m hopeful for the third, especially after the Mother Superior of the series Jessica Lange has been confirmed tor return, and Kathy Bates (yes, THAT Kathy Bates) will be joining the cast too. Glee is Dead; Long Live Horror Story.

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March 19, 2013

Hairy Bikers and Happiness

As many of you may know, I am a somewhat cynical person. People are bastards until proven innocent. I am most often found lounging around some bar in a leather skirt with a pretentious beer in one hand and a big book of people I don’t like in the other. But today I found my cynicism surgically removed for a few hours, reduced to the level of an infant child gurgling with unrestrained joy because someone dangled a brightly coloured plastic triangle over my cot. And the brightly coloured plastic triangle in question? The Hairy Bikers.

To misquote Nigel Slater, “there is too much talk of food being an art or a science when we are just making ourselves something to eat”. The Hairy Bikers are the ultimate embodiment of this philosophy; Si King and Dave Myers, two blustering amateur cooks from North England who rose to fame with their mixture of proper, proper food and refined laddish banter. I discovered their new series today; Hairy Bikers Everyday Gourmet, where they make unbelievably delicious food on a budget of next-to-nothing. What’s I find most endearing about them is their mangling of normally pretentious foodie phrases; gourmet becomes “GAAAWMAAAY”, canapes become “canaypes”, flavour becomes “flaaaaayver”. Their cuddly ladishness is also simply wonderful; I just glanced at the episode I have on now to find Si pelvic thrusting while the droning foodie they were shadowing was looking the other way.

I know I bring everything back round to sex, but it’s more than that with these two. They are the perfect husbands- good-natured, gently amusing, unpretentious  delightfully bumbling and chubbier than me. Though within weeks of the honeymoon I know I’d look like a blob of cream that had been strategically dressed and bewigged. And I’m still calling dibs on them both. Right? Right.

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March 5, 2013

A Wanker’s Literary Reaction: River City

It’s the middle of the bloody night,  I have lectures in seven hours time, and my body has just laughed in my face and decided that sleep is a commodity I can simply do without today. So, what to do? Raid the vending machines upstairs, wrap myself in a duvet, and feebly mock something that’s far more popular than I will ever be. Namely, a wanker’s literary reaction to River City. Take that, BBC who have created some of my all-time favourite shows and generally been a paragon of broadcasting virtue throughout my entire media-consuming lifespan!

Ah yes, the theme music! The opening sequence features 24-style split-screening and extensive shots of a stone lion, despite the fact that said lion rarely features as a key player in any of the episodes. What I’d like to draw your attention to at this point is the fact that River Shitty (too easy, really) does make a point of hiring the worst actors you can imagine. In fact, they’re so bad I started to think halfway through the episode that this was a deliberate parody of really terrible acting and that I was actually viewing some of the most innovative performances of my generation. What’s particularly striking is that many of the actors look like other people on TV- there’s one lad who looks like Bruce Forsyth might had he chosen a career as a pornstar, and another who looks like John Simm as redesigned with a plank full of rusty nails. The one thing all the performances have in common, aside from the lookalike factor, is the awful, dead look behind their eyes, the look that says they know their only viewers are themselves, peering into the camera as if trying to work out if their future selves are actually watching or have finally ended the sweet torment. I glanced over the Wikipedia page to do some “research” before starting this post- the article seems to sum up the passage of the show, starting out with thorough, brisk paragraphs, before descending into staccato half-sentences like a lost soldier futilely radioing for help from a platoon he knows is long, long dead.

I’d totally forgotten this soap was set in Scotland till I was greeted by what I can only describe as the west end Glaswegian shriek. Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against Glaswegian accents for the most part, but for some reason here it feels as if someone is forcing a handful of  switchblades into my ear for half an hour. And I say that as a born-and-bred Invernshneckian, having been subjected to the horrendous Invernesian caw for seventeen years before I made my escape. Unlike many other mainstream soaps, River City is pretty much a relentless stream of grimness; depicting Scottish life as a bombardment of drizzle, corruption, promiscuity and booze. I find this a little unfair, considering we have at least a few good chippies.

So there’s Scotland’s top soap for you: life’s a bad-weathered bitch, then you end up in River City. Oh, flower of Scotland…

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March 3, 2013

Go the Fucking Sisterhood

It’s been an alternately entertaining and soul-crushing day. I spent nine hours writing an essay, during which I dropped the complete works of Shakespeare on my face, nearly shattered my nose in the process, shortly afterwards became the first person to use the phrase “ow ow ow ow ow ow FUCKERS”, and had far too good a time twirling around on my desk chair, eating Skittles, and trying to stem the nasal bleeding with a discarded pair of pyjama bottoms. Taste the rainbow? Taste the mixture of my own phlegm and blood, more like.

Speaking of things that have been alternately entertaining and soul-crushing, I marathoned US sitcom 2 Broke Girls today. Aside from the fact that it stars my wife, Kat Dennings (Those eyes! Those lips! Those breasts! Those child-bearing hips!), I keep coming back to this upstart show. The premise is simple; sassy waitress Max (Dennings) takes in the newly poverty-stricken Caroline Channing, a shrill blonde pencil turned shrill blonde pencil, played by almost offensively less attractive Beth Behrs, and they resolve to start a cupcake business (disappointingly, not a euphemism for Kat selling her chebs on the street). The chemistry between the two leads is undeniable; a genius match of Behr’s superb physical comedy and Denning’s grimly amusing asides about her sex, drugs and childhood (summation: it was rubbish but it’s okay because she’s hot) that more or less carries the show. The supporting characters, namely the other employees at the diner where they both work and mad Polish Sophie played by a triumphantly crass Jennifer Coolidge, spend a good three-quarters of their screentime making foul sex jokes, drinking, being pedantic and managing to be both head-scratchingly racist and moderately bearable. Finally, somebody I can relate too.

And those are the good parts done with. It was “created by”  Micheal Patrick King who did Sex and the Shitty, and his “GO THE FUCKING SISTERHOOD!” stamp has been crapped indiscriminately all over the show. Now, I’m not a woman who buys into the whole “all girls together” shtick; frankly, I’m suspicious of anyone who thinks we should have some sort of instant connection and mutual respect because we both have labia. Menstruation has never nor will ever be the basis of any great friendship, as there are just as many women I’d like to shank as there are men. You get my respect by being sound, not by having breasts. Though that doesn’t hurt.

And that’s where 2 Broke Girls comes to bits. At the end of every episode, there’s a seemingly required scene where the stellar writing is undone by a presumably mad-with-power Caligula Patrick King cramming in an exchange where Dennings and Behr are essentially forced to platonically rub up on each other to justify their “friendship”. Their dynamic isn’t that of other odd-couple stylings on TV, like Chandler and Joey or another example. The couple that continues to rove into my minds eye is Basil and Sybil Fawlty; that sniping, unlikely, bitter marriage of two ambitious but stifled bastards. If they played to that dynamic, maybe it would work, but as long as they continue forcing the pair to emotionally finger each other (as if the relationship wasn’t sapphic enough) the whole thing smacks of wide-eyed innocence that it simply can’t carry off.

On a side note, wouldn’t mind a go on Jennifer Coolidge either.

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