Some of then are probably still lurking on the HDD recorderboxthingy (I liked it when you just said "video"), but here's the grumpyf1 review of some of the stuff on the telebox over the Christmas/New Year period.
Handy hint: If I haven't reviewed it, it's because:
a) I forgot to watch it
b) I haven't watched it yet
c) I'm not interested in watching it
d) The damson gin consumed during the festive period has clouded my memory sufficiently that I don't recollect it
OK... Here we go then...
Doctor Who: A jolly festive romp, although I'm already hankering for the days when it was a good story with Christmas added in, rather than Christmas first. I found myself struggling to remove the image of the stressed Mum from Outnumbered from my mind every time Madge was on screen, the whole Xmas-present-that-leads-to-a-snowy-forest bit has kind of been done before (!), if you blinked you'd have missed Bill Bailey's much hyped appearance, and Armstrong (or is it Miller....?) as a WW2 pilot?! Had no-one seen the Armstrong & Miller sketches? Isn't it? Isn't it though? S'up blood?
Still, the Doctor's "I know!" each time he showed the kids another miraculous room in the mansion was great, and the brief Rory & Amy appearance at the end a nice touch.
Now, why was it impossible to like the kids, and why did the boy look like a budget Harry Potter...?
Grumpyf1 rating: 8/10
Outnumbered: Oh dear. Outnumbered has been slowly, but steadily, getting less funny the longer it stays on the TV. Once essential viewing, I'm now luck to chuckle more than once or twice per episode.
This Christmas special featured a completely unfunny section on Grandad being in a home suffering from dementia. Yeah - hilarious. Not.
Depressing, and largely humour free, Outnumbered is descending into soap territory. Shame - I used to love it.
Grumpyf1 rating: 3/10
Rev: I still haven't quite got my head around Rev. It sometimes plays like a gently, old-fashioned Last Of The Summer Wine-style comedy, then smacks you round the brain with death, swearing, sex and violence before finishing off with a swift kick-in-the-nuts of social comment.
I rather like that. The final episode of the series took place in the build up to Christmas and featured a genuinely sad death, startling violent moment, but still managed to be gently, but brilliantly, humourous without descending into smugness. And it has the actress in it who used to play the hard as nails one in Drop The Dead Donkey. Win!
Grumpyf1 rating: 9/10
Sherlock: I bloody loved the first series (although there are so few - three this time - that 'series' is a bit too grand a title. Handful, maybe?). Written by the the man that brought Doctor Who back, it was a clever update of the Holmes tales of old, and the new handful got off to a flying start.
Sexy intelligent dominatrix, darkly funny moment involving an impatient and insensitive Holmes telling two small children what REALLY happened to grandad, plus a zippy plot, great use of graphics and a genius moment and nod to the Sherlocks of the past involving a hat, 90 minutes zipped by all too soon. Fantastic. Can't fault it. Yes, this is me being enthusiastic - it does happen occasionally. Get over it.
Grumpyf1 rating: 10/10
Top Gear: This programme has had me unable to breathe I laughed so much, and unable to see for the tears. Not this year, though. The Indian special was flatter than a steamrollered bhaji. The same, tired, ideas were recycled again (signs that read something rude when a bit goes missing, Hamster's car gets broken, Clarkson is a dangerous oaf, May wants to do things properly), but law of diminishing returns really caught up this time.
It was like going out for a meal with mates you used to have an absolute blast with, and finding yourself thinking "Well, they're the same people... and we're doing the same sort of thing... but it's just not as much fun as it used to be".
Grumpyf1 rating: 6/10
Top of the Pops: My heartfelt thanks go to BBC4 for showing all the TOTP's from '76, in the same week as they were originally broadcast. Having got used to TOTP2 in later years, it was easy to assume all of 1976 was bloody awesome musically. Some of it certainly was, but there was also a bigger helping of turkeys than you'd get at your Mum's on Christmas day.
The '76 Xmas special was an all budgets spared re-showing of previous appearances and video clips, smugly hosted by DLT and Noel Tidybeard, who were attempting (and succeeding) to be as annoying as humanely possible.
Still - cracking songs, and you can't beat a bit of Bo Rhap, can you?
The TOTP2 Christmas special clocked in at an impressive 90 minutes, and wisely featured not just the festive songs of Christmases past, but some of the non-cash-in records that were also at the top spot for Crimbo in days of yore.
Grumpyf1 rating: 8/10 (Would have been higher if TOTP2 hadn't show Bieber... and someone had bombed Radio 1 in 1976. No, I didn't watch the new one, or I'd be giving a negative figure.)
Morecambe & Wise: Wow - there was a LOT of Eric & Ernie on over Christmas. A cracking best of on BBC1, a repeat of the Eric & Ernie night on BBC 2, with a Paul Merton programme looking at their history with some celeb chums, the BAFTA winning dramatisation of their early years and a gob-smacking Parkinson featuring the pair, and showcasing Eric's lightning wit.
A bit like TOTP though, with the continued repeating each year of the best sketches, its easy to forget that they did produced some less stellar work, as shown by Channel 5's showing of 2 Christmas Specials from the early 80's. Amusing, but hardly essential, neither featured any of the sketches that appear in the compilation shows.
Still, I got to see the Andre Previn sketch again - a masterpiece of timing and precision comedy from all involved, that still has me in stitches even though I must have seen it 100 times.
My Dad was right. M&W are proper comedy.
Grumpyf1 rating 9/10 (Let down only by the Ch5 shows)
(Roger Taylor from that Queen lot had his own band for a bit - The Cross. Tonight I'm getting funky to their first LP from '87 - Shove It.)
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