House of stars...

Some very familiar faces are popping up in the first Series of House! Some of these characters are from my favourite shows so I thought I'd keep a bit of a tally!

So far we've had;

Robin Tunney (Veronica Donovan - Prison Break)
Dominic Purcell (Lincol Burrows - Prison Break)
Sarah Clarke (Nina Myers - 24)
Lester Carbonell (Richard Alpert - Lost)

And the new character Edward Vogler reminds me of Big Mike from Chuck!

Death at a Funeral

If you’re looking for a mad cap British comedy to watch, check out Death at a funeral. It’s ..... father’s funeral and things aren’t going too well, but with the arrival of a mysterious (short) stranger, things go from bad to worse. There are plenty of familiar faces including Daisy Donovan, Kris Marshall and Keeley Hawes, not to mention a few pooh gags!

Gavin & Stacey

I watched the Gavin and Stacey Xmas special without ever seeing the actual show which had come on and gone on BBC Three. I did find it rather amusing so I decided to check out series one and I wasn’t disappointed! The British don’t seem to churn out quality comedies in the way the Americans seem to, so this was a joy to watch. Not since the days of Men Behaving Badly and Only Fools and Horses have we had such a great show to chuckle along to. The best thing about this brand of comedy is how subtle a lot of the gags are because everything is played out so realistically.

The basic story for the show is the relationship between Gavin and Stacey, Gavin who lives in Essex and Stacey in Barry, Wales. Their love life blossoms on the phone and in the first episode we see the two lovers meet for the first time in London. By the second episode Gavin has proposed to Stacey and she has accepted, the rest of the series follows their journey to their wedding day. The other major plot line is the relationship between Smithy (Gavin’s best mate) and Nessa (Stacey’s best mate), after a one night stand it turns out that Nessa is preggers and Smithy is the father, which would not have been a problem, had the two not hated each other!

The characters Gavin and Stacey are fine, it’s nice to see Matthew Horne move on from his bit part role in the Catherine Tate Show to bigger and better things, but it’s the supporting cast that make this show, what it is. First off we have Smithy, he’s fat, brash and loud but still has an air of cheeky charm about him, his opposite number, Nessa is a big burly welsh lass with a mysterious past. The chemistry between the two is brilliant (which it should be seeing as though they are both co producers for the show!), especially in the first episode when Smithy meets her for the first time and thinks she’s a minger! Even bit part characters like the warring couple Pete and Dawn have me cracking up. But my favourite character by far has to be Bryn played by Rob Brydon. Bryn is an exact copy of Brydon’s previous incarnation, Keith Barrett, who seemed to vanish from our screens all of a sudden. Brydon play’s Stacey’s Uncle who is fascinated by technology and manages to bore anyone and everyone! His refusal to speak to Jason (Stacey’s gay brother) is awkward and hilarious at the same time and we are all desperate to find out what happened between Bryn and Jason on the fishing trip!

I can’t wait to find out what happens in the second series and news coming from Ruth Jones and James Corden is that a third series is a strong possibility!

Hustle

I caught the first two episodes of the latest series and thought they were alright but not as engrossing as previous seasons. Although it was great to see the return of Mickey Briggs, what happened to Stacey and Danny? They were barely mentioned, not to mention the fact that Albert is stuck in prison! I hate it when characters are just dropped without proper explanations like that. The new brother and sister duo are OK but will they fill the void left by Danny Blue and Stacey? The girl looked familiar but I couldn’t recall where I had seen her before, IMDB informs me that she played Mickie in Casualty! I’ve got the rest of the series somewhere so I’ll give it another go soon.

House

I've started to watch the first season of House starring Hugh Laurie. Having been used to seeing him on British TV in the 90's on shows like Smith & Jones and Blackadder, it's a little weird seeing the actor adopting an American accent!

The first three episodes have been interesting and the character played by Laurie is fantastic! I especially liked the scene where he gave a hypocondriac a bottle of sweets claiming them to be pills! His relationship with Dr Cutty is fun, it's so obvious that they are going to hook up at some point! Looking forward to seeing how this season progresses.

Tropic Thunder

I remember seeing the trailer for Tropic Thunder and thinking to myself this film could be the best comedy of the year, unfortuantely, the film never lived up to the hype of the trailer. The concept is brilliant, a bunch of ego driven Hollywood stars go deep in the jungle to shoot a film, but what they don't know is that what they are facing is actually real life. But for some reason it just doesn't flow as well as it should.

Robert Downey Junior is brilliant, he plays the white guy pretending to be the black guy playing the black guy! Ben Stiller does his usual self parody act which amuses but Jack Black is quite frankly rubbish but that may have been down to the fact that his character was very two dimensional. Tom Cruise pops up in a cameo and almost steals the show as the foul mouthed film producer Les Grossman and his dance at the end is hilarious!

While I found the humour to be about the right level and the action fast paced, something just didn't work and although I enjoyed it, I didn't like it as much as I thought I would have. You know what I mean?

How to lose friends and alienate people

I’m a big Simon Pegg fan, I loved Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz and didn’t hate Run Fat Boy Run as much as others did. For this reason I was looking forward to his latest caper, HTLFAAP (I can’t be arsed to type the whole title out every time). With a solid cast including Gillian Anderson, Megan Fox and Kisrten Dunst, I had great hopes for this flick which makes the disappointment evn harder to deal with. One word can pretty much sum up this movie – AWFUL!

Unfortunately, it really is that bad. Pegg’s character is a dick from the get go and it’s difficult to actually feel any kind of sympathy for him. The plot is wafer thin, Pegg plays a hack desperate to make it big in the world of glossy magazines and celebrities and desperate to shag the next big star Sophie Maes played by Megan Fox. Along the way he falls in love with Kirsten Dunst but by this time most of the audience were probably trying to find the exits.

Is it me or is Kirsten Dunst a bit ugly? She looks like she just got out of bed and hasn’t put any make up on. Having said that, Megan Fox is highly over-rated in the totty stakes in my opinion, she’s got some crazy eyebrows and reminds me too much of Stacey Slater from Eastenders!
HTLFAAP is rubbish, Pegg fails to impress at any level and the rest of the star studded cast do their best in a comedy that just isn’t funny. If you only ever watch one Simon Pegg movie this year, make sure it’s not this one!

1 out of 5

WWE: The return of Christian

WOW, Christian Cage gave up his main event spot in TNA to return to WWE and find himself on ECW?! WTF?

Seriously, what a waste of a return, having Christian come out on an ECW show. I watched the segment in disbelief, whilst Christian was solid on the mic, his presence on ECW is a disgrace. I'm just hoping that the WWE are just putting him on ECW for a short period and either they let him win Money in the Bank or draft him to Raw or Smackdown in the April draft. Until then, he can look forward to feuding with the Boogey Man!

24: Day 7 - 3pm to 4pm

Just finished watching another cracking episode of the new season of 24. So much took place in this episode I might need to watch it again to remember what happened! This season has been the best in a very long time, the return of Tony Almedia and his renegade group which includes Bill Buchanan and Chloe are a personal highlight.

Quick recap: President Taylor announces that the country is safe from any imminent danger and the planned attack on Sangala will continue. Meanwhile President Matobo and his band of outlaws enter the White House through a secret entrance. Whilst Bill, Jack and Renee are being grilled by the President, a phone call from Dubaku is recieved, he has the first gentleman and if Taylor does not withdraw her troops, he will die. Taylor is in a quandry, on one hand the life of thousands of Sangalans are at stake and on the other, the life of her husband. Enter Jack, he gives her a choice, trust him and he can do a job for her, she questions where his loyalties lie to which he simply replies "with all due respect madam president, ask around" Bam! Jack is back on the case! With a little help from reluctant FBI Agent, Larry Moss, Jack and Renee apprehend renegade CIA agent Vosler and get him to give them Dubaku's location. Renee is forced to take Agent Vosler's family hostage in order to get their man to cough which doesn't sit well with her. Meanwhile, Dubaku, who is leading a double life as Sam the Sangalan refugee, finds himself being investigated by the sister of his girlfriend Marika. Jack and Renee arrive at the grocery store where the first gentleman is held and kill everyone, but not before the first gentleman takes a bullet to the chest and the countdown begins.....

- I'm loving the way Renee is so conflicted about Jack's techniques and his 'by any means necessary' attitude. She's so used to playing it by the book that Jack's actions terrify her but she goes laong with it because she knows that playing by the book doesn't get things done.

- Agent Larry Moss is a jack ass, but ulitmately he's a good guy. It's summed up by the little exchange between Jack and Larry where he says to him "the rules are what make us better." I bet I regret that comment and Larry turns out to be a mole!

- I think Marika could be the key to tracking Samuel/Dubaku down as for her sister in the wheelchair - she's a goner already!

- I don't think the First Gentleman is going to die, otherwise it'll leave Jack in a tight spot as the president put her trust in him. If the Henry Taylor dies, that makes Jack's presence redundant.

- I'm surprised how easily Dubaku's attempt to stop the Sangala invasion have failed so easily. First of all the C.I.P. device was captured in the last episode and the kidnapping of Henry Taylor was concluded very swiftly. I wonder what's next?

Bones - Two bodies in the lab

The best episode of Bones I've seen so far from season 1. Two attempts on Brennan's life, one of which puts Booth in hospital and Hodgens gets in on the action! The only thing that keeps bugging me right now is the fact that Zach is fast becoming my favourite character but I now know he's going to be written out of the show! I've not felt this disappointment since finding out Sgt Doakes was getting killed in Season 2 of Dexter.

Bones

I'm really glad I gave this another go because I'm really getting in to this show. The chemistry between Booth and Brennan makes the show, the cases keep the show fresh despite being pretty grusome and watching the msytery unravel is always interesting.

One of the best things about a show in my opinion are the supporting cast. If the cast is weak, the show suffers, where as the Bones staff are all solid. My personal favourite is Dr Zach Addy, he's supremely intelligent yet lacks the social ettiquette to interact with normal people. Unfortunately I was a little careless and found out by mistake that Zach becomes a bad guy in season 3 and is written out of the show! Damn!

The other great thing about Bones is it's theme music. The best theme music for a TV show since Ghostbusters!