For anyone who missed it, the trailer for the forthcoming Dad’s Army movie was released a couple of weeks ago. It's due in cinemas in February.

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I'm a bit cautious about the prospect of a movie, because the one with the original cast back in the 1970s was an absolute turkey. Why did so many perfectly good sitcoms of the period wind up as terrible ( Read more... )

I’ve taken a bit of an interest in Dad’s Army ever since I ran a short-lived roleplaying game in the 1990s in which the player characters were members of the Home Guard, dealing with mysterious happenings which turned out to be due to a burrow of Wombles rather than fifth-columnists - although one of the Wombles was blessed with the name Berlin…

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It suddenly occurred to me that a Cavorite Sphere - as developed by Mr. Cavor in H.G. Wells’ The First Men in the Moon - is something that I did not have, and I searched for such a thing.

I discovered that there are two on the market suitable for 28mm. One is relatively easy to find mention of, but is sold in the US and doesn’t seem particularly ( Read more... )

Of course I already knew which episode of Doctor Who was on the day I was born; I mean, who doesn’t know their natal episode? ;-) And naturally, it’s a classic…

It’s interesting to see what else was on though; on BBC One, Doctor Who was preceded by Grandstand and Juke Box Jury, and followed by The Dick van Dyke Show and The Munsters, then a film ( ( Read more... )

Over the last few years, it's often been something about the reporting of the independence debate that's spurred me to write about politics on this (generally) non-political blog. (Hopefully soon I'll have nothing more to say.)

Here's an interesting short online documentary featuring Professor John Robertson talking about his findings of bias in BBC ( Read more... )

Fear them!

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A double bill with "Back Toy The Future":

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This probably won’t come as a surprise to anyone paying attention (apart from Ian Davidson, who seems to think it’s the other way round), but a study at the University of the West Coast of Scotland has found that the BBC, and to a lesser extent STV, are favouring the No campaign in their news coverage of the independence referendum. It’s worth ( Read more... )

Channel 4 is doing an evening of programmes about psychopaths, and have a handy-dandy test where you can assess your own level of psychopathy.

Uninterestingly but perhaps reassuringly, it turns out I’m a teddy bear, scoring 21%:

You are warm and empathic with a heightened awareness of social responsibility and a strong sense of conscience. You ( Read more... )

Must-watch official prequel to The Day of the Doctor, the 50th anniversary episode:

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Here's the response I got to my complaint to Question Time:

Dear Dr. GREIG

Thanks for taking the time to contact the BBC about Question Time, broadcast on 13 June 2013. We forwarded your concerns to the Executive Editor who passed on the following response:

Question Time is a current affairs programme that covers a ( Read more... )