Wednesday, June 09, 2004
Summer in the Sixties on BBC4
I know it wasn't sci-fi/fantasy (but there's a night of that coming towards the end of the season), but what a cock-up Saturday night's "Summer in the Sixties" was.
First up, we have the usual BBC4 aspect ratio problems. Not only is having to manually change picture settings bloody annoying, but it's also unacceptable. If you're not watching the channel live then you're let with a pillarboxed picture with black bars on all four sides, and even if you are, changing the picture settings risks missing part of the programmes.
What made it all the more disappointing was that Saturday in particular was a cracking night of 60s programming - including "The Magic Roundabout", an atypical "Coronation Street", "Dusty", "Thirty Minute Theatre: The Newsbenders". It was disappointing that "Not Only But Also" was pulled, but the replacement "Marty" was still more than acceptable (the same can't be said for Sunday's "'Til Death Us Do Part" which was deeply unfunny and seemed to drag on forever).
Disappointingly, the "Doctor Who" episode scheduled for the end of the month appears to be 'The Web of Fear: 1'.
Many of us had hoped for 'Day of Armageddon', the recently recovered second episode from 'The Daleks' Master Plan', but if the rumoured "Missing Episodes" boxed set is really coming this autumn, then it's not exactly a surprise that it's not being shown. In these circumstances, either of the two Yeti episodes are reasonable choices, although 'Web' was included on last year's 'Reign of Terror' boxed set ('The Abominable Snowmen: 2' was on the long-deleted "Troughton Years" VHS release).
A slightly disappointing "Who" selection for the programme, although hopefully fans will have a commercial release of 'Day of Armageddon' sooner rather than later anyway. Repeats of "The Kneale Tapes" and "Alchemists of Sound" will be useful for those who missed them the first time around, plus there's an episode of "Adam Adamant Lives!" as well as "The Year of the Sex Olympics".
As long as the BBC don't screw up the aspect ratios, then we could be in for a good night.
I know it wasn't sci-fi/fantasy (but there's a night of that coming towards the end of the season), but what a cock-up Saturday night's "Summer in the Sixties" was.
First up, we have the usual BBC4 aspect ratio problems. Not only is having to manually change picture settings bloody annoying, but it's also unacceptable. If you're not watching the channel live then you're let with a pillarboxed picture with black bars on all four sides, and even if you are, changing the picture settings risks missing part of the programmes.
What made it all the more disappointing was that Saturday in particular was a cracking night of 60s programming - including "The Magic Roundabout", an atypical "Coronation Street", "Dusty", "Thirty Minute Theatre: The Newsbenders". It was disappointing that "Not Only But Also" was pulled, but the replacement "Marty" was still more than acceptable (the same can't be said for Sunday's "'Til Death Us Do Part" which was deeply unfunny and seemed to drag on forever).
Disappointingly, the "Doctor Who" episode scheduled for the end of the month appears to be 'The Web of Fear: 1'.
Many of us had hoped for 'Day of Armageddon', the recently recovered second episode from 'The Daleks' Master Plan', but if the rumoured "Missing Episodes" boxed set is really coming this autumn, then it's not exactly a surprise that it's not being shown. In these circumstances, either of the two Yeti episodes are reasonable choices, although 'Web' was included on last year's 'Reign of Terror' boxed set ('The Abominable Snowmen: 2' was on the long-deleted "Troughton Years" VHS release).
A slightly disappointing "Who" selection for the programme, although hopefully fans will have a commercial release of 'Day of Armageddon' sooner rather than later anyway. Repeats of "The Kneale Tapes" and "Alchemists of Sound" will be useful for those who missed them the first time around, plus there's an episode of "Adam Adamant Lives!" as well as "The Year of the Sex Olympics".
As long as the BBC don't screw up the aspect ratios, then we could be in for a good night.
