The Hour - The BBC is still brill
A few words on 'The Hour', the 6 part series that was on the BBC recently. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b012rwmc
You do wonder sometimes if the BBC is ever going to do something truly brilliant ever again. They've got a long history of classic dramas, but what have they done for us lately? The answer is 'The Hour' a series about a news program, set in 1956 during the Suez Crisis.
One benchmark of a good TV show, according to a friend of mine, is whether you know the character's names. Personally I think this is simply a measure of how often they repeat each other's names, I'll never forget Tetsuo and Kaneda from the anime film 'Akira' because 90% of the dialogue was them shouting after each other. There wasn't much of that in 'The Hour', but by the end of the series I not only knew Frederick Lyon, Hector Madden, Bel Rowley, Clarence, Issac, Sissy, Blicks, Lord Elms, Ruthie, Thomas Kisch, Del Ray, McCain and Douglas, but I also knew that the series was set from July to November of 1956.
It was an absolute joy getting to know all these characters over the six episodes. The pacing was fairly slow, in fact it was a similar speed to the recent series of Torchwood. Yet unlike Torchwood, The Hour wasn't utterly wretched. Everything was so well judged in The Hour, there were exactly the right number of sub-plots, the love affairs were all believable and real, we got exactly the right number of extra clues for the conspiracy each week and the conclusion was so satisfying and thrilling that Simon and I genuinely sat on the edge of the sofa. That's an accolade usually reserved for Doctor Who season finales and episodes of I, Claudius!
Continuing the comparison with Torchwood, this show had Burn Gorman as Kisch, who played Owen in Torchwood. In this show, Burn was perfectly cast as a sinister, dark character, utterly uncomfortable socially and capable of murder. Torchwood cast him as a sexy young buck. Now Burn is a fantastic actor and is fairly good looking, but he came across a lot better in The Hour.
Random thoughts:
The setting seemed perfectly realised, except for one scene where Freddie walks down a suburban street, with modern garage doors and road signs. It seemed very wrong.
Oh look! It's Lime Grove! Don't they know that Doctor Who was going to be filmed there?
Tim Piggot-Smith is still amazing.
Hector started off as an unlikable character, but he had so much natural, Carey Grant-style charm that he won us over by episode two. The git is having an affair with the female lead (Bel), keeping her away from the male lead (Freddie) and he's still sympathetic! Also, get him presenting BBC News, he's far better than any of the other presenters.
And isn't Ben Whishaw a) unbelievably skinny and b) like a 1950's version of Matt Smith's Doctor Who?
You do wonder sometimes if the BBC is ever going to do something truly brilliant ever again. They've got a long history of classic dramas, but what have they done for us lately? The answer is 'The Hour' a series about a news program, set in 1956 during the Suez Crisis.
One benchmark of a good TV show, according to a friend of mine, is whether you know the character's names. Personally I think this is simply a measure of how often they repeat each other's names, I'll never forget Tetsuo and Kaneda from the anime film 'Akira' because 90% of the dialogue was them shouting after each other. There wasn't much of that in 'The Hour', but by the end of the series I not only knew Frederick Lyon, Hector Madden, Bel Rowley, Clarence, Issac, Sissy, Blicks, Lord Elms, Ruthie, Thomas Kisch, Del Ray, McCain and Douglas, but I also knew that the series was set from July to November of 1956.
It was an absolute joy getting to know all these characters over the six episodes. The pacing was fairly slow, in fact it was a similar speed to the recent series of Torchwood. Yet unlike Torchwood, The Hour wasn't utterly wretched. Everything was so well judged in The Hour, there were exactly the right number of sub-plots, the love affairs were all believable and real, we got exactly the right number of extra clues for the conspiracy each week and the conclusion was so satisfying and thrilling that Simon and I genuinely sat on the edge of the sofa. That's an accolade usually reserved for Doctor Who season finales and episodes of I, Claudius!
Continuing the comparison with Torchwood, this show had Burn Gorman as Kisch, who played Owen in Torchwood. In this show, Burn was perfectly cast as a sinister, dark character, utterly uncomfortable socially and capable of murder. Torchwood cast him as a sexy young buck. Now Burn is a fantastic actor and is fairly good looking, but he came across a lot better in The Hour.
Random thoughts:
The setting seemed perfectly realised, except for one scene where Freddie walks down a suburban street, with modern garage doors and road signs. It seemed very wrong.
Oh look! It's Lime Grove! Don't they know that Doctor Who was going to be filmed there?
Tim Piggot-Smith is still amazing.
Hector started off as an unlikable character, but he had so much natural, Carey Grant-style charm that he won us over by episode two. The git is having an affair with the female lead (Bel), keeping her away from the male lead (Freddie) and he's still sympathetic! Also, get him presenting BBC News, he's far better than any of the other presenters.
And isn't Ben Whishaw a) unbelievably skinny and b) like a 1950's version of Matt Smith's Doctor Who?